miVERSITY 

<TH  CAROL" 

Science 


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http://www.archive.org/details/understoodbetsyOfishe 


Uncle  Henry  looked  at  h 


er   eyeing  her  sidewise  over  the  top  of  one 
spectacle-glass.      (Page  34.) 


UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 


BY 
DOROTHY   CANFIELD 

Author  of  "The  Bent  Twig,"  etc. 


ILLUSTRATIONS  BY 

ADA   C.    WILLIAMSON 


NEW  YORK 

HENRY  HOLT  AND  COMPANY 

1917 


Copyright,  1916,  1917, 


THE  CENTURY  CO. 


Copyright,  1917, 


HENRY  HOLT  AND,  COMPANY 


Published  August,  1917 


PRINTED    IN    THE    USA 


Univ.  of 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PASS 

I  Aunt  Harriet  Has  a  Cough       ...  1 

II  Betsy  Holds  the  Reins       ....  27 

III  A  Short  Morning 52 

IV  Betsy  Goes  to  School 74 

V  What  Grade  is  Betsy?      ....  89 

VI  If  You  Don't  Like   Conversation  in  a 

Book   Skip  this  Chapter!     .        .  .110 

VII  Elizabeth  Ann  Fails  in  an  Examination    137 

VIII  Betsy  Starts  a  Sewing  Society        .  .     161 

IX  The  New  Clothes  Fail       .       .       .  .186 

X  Betsy  Has  a  Birthday       .       .       .  .201 

XI  "Understood  Aunt  Frances"  .       .  .234 


. 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Uncle  Henry  looked  at  her,  eying  her  sidewise 
over  the  top  of  one  spectacle-glass  .     Frontispiece 

FACING 
PAGE 

Elizabeth  Ann  stood  up  before  the  doctor  .       .       16 
"Do  you  know,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  "I  think 
it's  going  to  be  real  nice,  having  a  little  girl 

in  the  house  again" 48 

She  had  greatly  enjoyed  doing  he*  own  hair    .       54 
"Oh,  he's  asking  for  more!"  cried  Elizabeth 

Ann 78 

Betsy  shut  her  teeth  together  hard,  and  started 

across      .  108 

"What's  the  matter,  Molly?    What's  the  mat- 
ter?"       148 

Betsy  and  Ellen  and  the  old  doll       .        .        .162 
He  had  fallen  asleep  with  his  head  on  his  arms    182 
Never  were  dishes  washed  better!       .        .       .     222 
Betsy  was  staring  down  at  her  shoes,  biting  her 
lips  and  winking  her  eyes        ....     242 


UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

CHAPTER  I 
AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH 

When  this  story  begins,  Elizabeth  Ann,  who 
is  the  heroine  of  it,  was  a  little  girl  of  nine, 
who  lived  with  her  Great-aunt  Harriet  in  a 
medium-sized  city  in  a  medium-sized  State  in 
the  middle  of  this  country;  and  that's  all  you 
need  to  know  about  the  place,  for  it's  not  the 
important  thing  in  the  story;  and  anyhow  you 
know  all  about  it  because  it  was  probably  very 
much  like  the  place  you  live  in  yourself. 

Elizabeth  Ann's  Great-aunt  Harriet  was  a 
widow  who  was  not  very  rich  or  very  poor,  and 
she  had  one  daughter,  Frances,  who  gave  piano 
lessons  to  little  girls.  They  kept  a  "girl" 
whose  name  was  Grace  and  who  had  asthma 
dreadfully  and  wasn't  very  much  of  a  "girl"  at 


2  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

all,  being  nearer  fifty  than  forty.  Aunt  Har- 
riet, who  was  very  tender-hearted,  kept  her 
chiefly  because  she  couldn't  get  any  other  place 
on  account  of  her  coughing  so  you  could  hear 
her  all  over  the  house. 

So  now  you  know  the  names  of  all  the  house- 
hold. And  this  is  how  they  looked :  Aunt  Har- 
riet was  very  small  and  thin  and  old,  Grace 
was  very  small  and  thin  and  middle-aged, 
Aunt  Frances  (for  Elizabeth  Ann  called  her 
"  Aunt,"  although  she  was  really,  of  course,  a 
first-cousin-once-removed)  was  small  and  thin 
and  if  the  light  wasn't  too  strong  might  be 
called  young,  and  Elizabeth  Ann  was  very 
small  and  thin  and  little.  And  yet  they  all  had 
plenty  to  eat.  I  wonder  what  was  the  matter 
with  them? 

It  was  certainly  not  because  they  were  not 
good,  for  no  womenkind  in  all  the  world  had 
kinder  hearts  than  they.  You  have  heard  how 
Aunt  Harriet  kept  Grace  (in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  she  was  a  very  depressing  person)  on  ac- 
count of  her  asthma ;  and  when  Elizabeth  Ann's 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH         3 

father  and  mother  both  died  when  she  was  a 
baby,  although  there  were  many  other  cousins 
and  uncles  and  aunts  in  the  family,  these  two 
women  fairly  rushed  upon  the  little  baby- 
orphan,  taking  her  home  and  surrounding  her 
henceforth    with    the    most    loving    devotion. 

They  had  said  to  themselves  that  it  was  their 
manifest  duty  to  save  the  dear  little  thing 
from  the  other  relatives,  who  had  no  idea 
about  how  to  bring  up  a  sensitive,  impression- 
able child,  and  they  were  sure,  from  the  way 
Elizabeth  Ann  looked  at  six  months,  that  she 
was  going  to  be  a  sensitive,  impressionable 
child.  It  is  possible  also  that  they  were  a  lit- 
tle bored  with  their  empty  life  in  their  rather 
forlorn,  little  brick  house  in  the  medium-sized 
city,  and  that  they  welcomed  the  occupation 
and  new  interests  which  a  child  would  bring  in. 

But  they  thought  that  they  chiefly  desired  to 
save  dear  Edward's  child  from  the  other  kin, 
especially  from  the  Putney  cousins,  who  had 
written  down  from  their  Vermont  farm  that 
they  would  be  glad  to  take  the  little  girl  into 


4  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

their  family.  But  "anything  but  the  Put- 
neys!"  said  Aunt  Harriet,  a  great  many  times. 
They  were  related  only  by  marriage  to  her, 
and  she  had  her  own  opinion  of  them  as  a 
stiffnecked,  cold-hearted,  undemonstrative,  and 
hard  set  of  New  Englanders.  "I  boarded  near 
them  one  summer  when  you  were  a  baby, 
Frances,  and  I  shall  never  forget  the  way  they 
were  treating  some  children  visiting  there! 
.  .  .  Oh,  no,  I  don't  mean  they  abused  them 
or  beat  them  .  .  .  but  such  lack  of  sympathy, 
such  perfect  indifference  to  the  sacred  sensi- 
tiveness of  child-life,  such  a  starving  of  the 
child-heart.  .  .  .  No,  I  shall  never  forget  it! 
They  had  chores  to  do  .  .  .as  though  they 
had  been  hired  men!" 

Aunt  Harriet  never  meant  to  say  any  of 
this  when  Elizabeth  Ann  could  hear,  but  the 
little  girl's  ears  were  as  sharp  as  little  girls' 
ears  always  are,  and  long  before  she  was 
nine  she  knew  all  about  the  opinion  Aunt  Har- 
riet had  of  the  Putneys.  She  did  not  know, 
to  be  sure,  what  ''chores"  were,  but  she  took 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH  5 

it  confidently  from  Aunt  Harriet's  voice  that 
they  were  something  very,  very  dreadful. 

There  was  certainly  neither  coldness  nor 
hardness  in  the  way  Aunt  Harriet  and  Aunt 
Frances  treated  Elizabeth  Ann.  They  had 
really  given  themselves  up  to  the  new  responsi- 
bility, especially  Aunt  Frances,  who  was  very 
conscientious  about  everything.  As  soon  as  the 
baby  came  there  to  live,  Aunt  Frances  stopped 
reading  novels  and  magazines,  and  re-read  one 
book  after  another  which  told  her  how  to  bring 
up  children.  And  she  joined  a  Mothers'  Club 
which  met  once  a  week.  And  she  took  a  cor- 
respondence course  in  mothercraft  from  a 
school  in  Chicago  which  teaches  that  business 
by  mail.  So  you  can  see  that  by  the  time  Eliza- 
beth Ann  was  nine  years  old  Aunt  Frances 
must  have  known  all  that  anybody  can  know 
about  how  to  bring  up  children.  And  Eliza- 
beth Ann  got  the  benefit  of  it  all. 

She  and  her  Aunt  Frances  were  simply  in- 
separable. Aunt  Frances  shared  in  all  Eliza- 
beth Ann's  doings  and  even  in  all  her  thoughts. 


6  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

She  was  especially  anxious  to  share  all  the  lit- 
tle girl's  thoughts,  because  she  felt  that  the 
trouble  with  most  children  is  that  they  are  not 
understood,  and  she  was  determined  that  she 
would  thoroughly  understand  Elizabeth  Ann 
down  to  the  bottom  of  her  little  mind.  Aunt 
Frances  (down  in  the  bottom  of  her  own  mind) 
thought  that  her  mother  had  never  really  un- 
derstood her,  and  she  meant  to  do  better  by 
Elizabeth  Ann.  She  also  loved  the  little  girl 
with  all  her  heart,  and  longed,  above  everything 
in  the  world,  to  protect  her  from  all  harm  and 
to  keep  her  happy  and  strong  and  well. 

And  yet  Elizabeth  Ann  was  neither  very 
strong  nor  well.  And  as  to  her  being  happy, 
you  can  judge  for  yourself  when  you  have  read 
all  this  story.  She  was  very  small  for  her  age, 
with  a  rather  pale  face  and  big  dark  eyes  which 
had  in  them  a  frightened,  wistful  expression 
that  went  to  Aunt  Frances's  tender  heart  and 
made  her  ache  to  take  care  of  Elizabeth  Ann 
better  and  better. 

Aunt  Frances  was  afraid  of  a  great  many 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH         7 

things  herself,  and  she  knew  how  to  sympathize 
with  timidity.  She  was  always  quick  to  reas- 
sure the  little  girl  with  all  her  might  and  main 
whenever  there  was  anything  to  fear.  When 
they  were  out  walking  (Aunt  Frances  took 
her  out  for  a  walk  up  one  block^  and  down 
another  every  single  day,  no  matter  how  tired 
the  music  lessons  had  made  her),  the  aunt's 
eyes  were  always  on  the  alert  to  avoid  any- 
thing which  might  frighten  Elizabeth  Ann.  If 
a  big  dog  trotted  by,  Aunt  Frances  always 
said,  hastily:  "There,  there,  dear!  That's  a 
nice  doggie,  I'm  sure.  I  don't  believe  he  ever 
bites  little  girls.  .  .  .  Mercy!  Elizabeth  Ann, 
don't  go  near  him!  .  .  .  Here,  darling,  just 
get  on  the  other  side  of  Aunt  Frances  if  he 
scares  you  so"  (by  that  time  Elizabeth  Ann 
was  always  pretty  well  scared),  "and  perhaps 
we'd  better  just  turn  this  corner  and  walk  in 
the  other  direction. "  If  by  any  chance  the  dog 
went  in  that  direction  too,  Aunt  Frances  be- 
came a  prodigy  of  valiant  protection,  putting 
the  shivering  littl%  girl  behind  her,  threatening 


8  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

the  animal  with  her  umbrella,  and  saying  in  a 
trembling  voice,  "Go  away,  sir!  Go  away!" 

Or  if  it  thundered  and  lightened,  Aunt  Fran- 
ces always  dropped  everything  she  might  be 
doing  and  held  Elizabeth  Ann  tightly  in  her 
arms  until  it  was  all  over.  And  at  night — 
Elizabeth  Ann  did  not  sleep  very  well — when 
the  little  girl  woke  up  screaming  with  a  bad 
dream,  it  was  always  dear  Aunt  Frances  who 
came  to  her  bedside,  a  warm  wrapper  over  her 
nightgown  so  that  she  need  not  hurry  back  to 
her  own  room,  a  candle  lighting  up  her  tired, 
kind  face.  She  always  took  the  little  girl  into 
her  thin  arms  and  held  her  close  against  her 
thin  breast.  "Tell  Aunt  Frances  all  about 
your  naughty  dream,  darling,"  she  would  mur- 
mur, "so's  to  get  it  off  your  mind!" 

She  had  read  in  her  books  that  you  can  tell  a 
great  deal  about  children's  inner  lives  by  an- 
alyzing their  dreams,  and  besides,  if  she  did  not 
urge  Elizabeth  Ann  to  tell  it,  she  was  afraid  the 
sensitive,  nervous  little  thing  would  "lie  awake 
and  brood  over  it."    This  was  the  phrase  she 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH         9 

always  used  the  next  day  to  her  mother  when 
Aunt  Harriet  exclaimed  about  her  paleness  and 
the  dark  rings  under  her  eyes.  So  she  listened 
patiently  while  the  little  girl  told  her  all  about 
the  fearful  dreams  she  had,  the  great  dogs 
with  huge  red  mouths  that  ran  after  her,  the 
Indians  who  scalped  her,  her  schoolhouse  on 
fire  so  that  she  had  to  jump  from  a  third-story 
window  and  was  all  broken  to  bits — once  in  a 
while  Elizabeth  Ann  got  so  interested  in  all 
this  that  she  went  on  and  made  up  more  awful 
things  even  than  she  had  dreamed,  and  told 
long  stories  which  showed  her  to  be  a  child  of 
great  imagination.  But  all  these  dreams  and 
continuations  of  dreams  Aunt  Frances  wrote 
down  the  first  thing  the  next  morning,  and, 
with  frequent  references  to  a  thick  book  full  of 
hard  words,  she  tried  her  best  to  puzzle  out 
from  them  exactly  what  kind  of  little  girl 
Elizabeth  Ann  really  was. 

There  was  one  dream,  however,  that  even 
conscientious  Aunt  Frances  never  tried  to 
analyze,  because  it  was  too  sad.    Elizabeth  Ann 


o 


10  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

dreamed  sometimes  that  she  was  dead  and  lay 
in  a  little  white  coffin  with  white  roses  over  hor. 
Oh,  that  made  Aunt  Frances  cry,  and  so  did 
Elizabeth  Ann.  It  was  very  touching.  Then, 
after  a  long,  long  time  of  talk  and  tears  and 
sobs  and  hugs,  the  little  girl  would  begin  to  get 
drowsy,  and  Aunt  Frances  would  rock  her  to 
sleep  in  her  arms,  and  lay  her  down  ever  so 
quietly,  and  slip  away  to  try  to  get  a  little  nap 
herself  before  it  was  time  to  get  up. 

At  a  quarter  of  nine  every  week-day  morn- 
ing Aunt  Frances  dropped  whatever  else  she 
was  doing,  took  Elizabeth  Ann's  little,  thin, 
white  hand  protectingly  in  hers,  and  led  her 
through  the  busy  streets  to  the  big  brick  school- 
building  where  the  little  girl  had  always  gone 
to  school.  It  was  four  stories  high,  and  when 
all  the  classes  were  in  session  there  were  six 
hundred  children  under  that  one  roof.  You 
can  imagine,  perhaps,  the  noise  there  was  on  the 
playground  just  before  school !  Elizabeth  Ann 
shrank  from  it  with  all  her  soul,  and  clung 
more  tightly  than  ever  to  Aunt  Frances 's  hand 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH        11 

as  she  was  led  along  through  the  crowded, 
shrieking  masses  of  children.  Oh,  how  glad 
she  was  that  she  had  Aunt  Frances  there  to 
take  care  of  her,  though  as  a  matter  of  fact  no- 
body noticed  the  little  thin  girl  at  all,  and  her 
very  own  classmates  would  hardly  have  known 
whether  she  came  to  school  or  not.  Aunt 
Frances  took  her  safely  through  the  ordeal  of 
the  playground,  then  up  the  long,  broad  stairs, 
and  pigeonholed  her  carefully  in  her  own 
schoolroom.  She  was  in  the  third  grade, — 
3A,  you  understand,  which  is  almost  the 
fourth. 

Then  at  noon  Aunt  Frances  was  waiting 
there,  a  patient,  never-failing  figure,  to  walk 
home  with  her  little  charge;  and  in  the  after- 
noon the  same  thing  happened  over  again.  On 
the  way  to  and  from  school  they  talked  about 
what  had  happened  in  the  class.  Aunt  Frances 
believed  in  sympathizing  with  a  child's  life,  so 
she  always  asked  about  every  little  thing,  and 
remembered  to  inquire  about  the  continuation 
of  every  episode,  and  sympathized  with  all  her 


12  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

heart  over  the  failure  in  mental  arithmetic, 
and  triumphed  over  Elizabeth  Ann's  beating 
the  Schmidt  girl  in  spelling,  and  was  indignant 
over  the  teacher's  having  pets.  Sometimes  in 
telling  over  some  very  dreadful  failure  or  dis- 
appointment Elizabeth  Ann  would  get  so 
wrought  up  that  she  would  cry.  This  always 
brought  the  ready  tears  to  Aunt  Frances's 
kind  eyes,  and  with  many  soothing  words  and 
nervous,  tremulous  caresses  she  tried  to  make 
life  easier  for  poor  little  Elizabeth  Ann.  The 
days  when  they  had  cried  they  could  neither  of 
them  eat  much  luncheon. 

After  school  and  on  Saturdays  there  was  al- 
ways the  daily  walk,  and  there  were  lessons,  all 
kinds  of  lessons — piano-lessons  of  course,  and 
nature-study  lessons  out  of  an  excellent  book 
Aunt  Frances  had  bought,  and  painting  les- 
sons, and  sewing  lessons,  and  even  a  little 
French,  although  Aunt  Frances  was  not  very 
sure  about  her  own  pronunciation.  She  wanted 
to  give  the  little  girl  every  possible  advantage, 
you  see.    They  were  really  inseparable.    Eliza- 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH       13 

beth  Ann  once  said  to  some  ladies  calling  on 
her  aunts  that  whenever  anything  happened  in 
school,  the  first  thing  she  thought  of  was  what 
Aunt  Frances  would  think  of  it. 

"Why  is  that?"  they  asked,  looking  at  Aunt 
Frances,  who  was  blushing  with  pleasure. 

' i  Oh,  she  is  so  interested  in  my  school  work ! 
And  she  understands  me!"  said  Elizabeth  Ann, 
repeating  the  phrases  she  had  heard  so 
often. 

Aunt  Frances's  eyes  filled  with  happy  tears. 
She  called  Elizabeth  Ann  to  her  and  kissed  her 
and  gave  her  as  big  a  hug  as  her  thin  arms 
could  manage.  Elizabeth  Ann  was  growing 
tall  very  fast.  One  of  the  visting  ladies  said 
that  before  long  she  would  be  as  big  as  her 
auntie,  and  a  troublesome  young  lady.  Aunt 
Frances  said:  "I  have  had  her  from  the  time 
she  was  a  little  baby  and  there  has  scarcely 
been  an  hour  she  has  been  out  of  my  sight. 
I'll  always  have  her  confidence.  You'll  always 
tell  Aunt  Frances  everything,  won't  you,  dar- 
ling?"   Elizabeth  Ann  resolved  to  do  this  al- 


14  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ways,  even  if,  as  now,  she  often  had  to  invent 
things  to  tell. 

Aunt  Frances  went  on,  to  the  callers:  "But 
I  do  wish  she  weren't  so  thin  and  pale  and 
nervous.  I  suppose  it  is  the  exciting  modern 
life  that  is  so  bad  for  children.  I  try  to  see 
that  she  has  plenty  of  fresh  air.  I  go  out  with 
her  for  a  walk  every  single  day.  But  we  have 
taken  all  the  walks  around  here  so  often  that 
we're  rather  tired  of  them.  It's  often  hard  to 
know  how  to  get  her  out  enough.  I  think  I'll 
have  to  get  the  doctor  to  come  and  see  her  and 
perhaps  give  her  a  tonic."  To  Elizabeth  Ann 
she  added,  hastily:  "Now  don't  go  getting  no- 
tions in  your  head,  darling.  Aunt  Frances 
doesn't  think  there's  anything  very  much  the 
matter  with  you.  You'll  be  all  right  again 
.soon  if  you  just  take  the  doctor's  medicine 
nicely.  Aunt  Frances  will  take  care  of  her 
precious  little  girl.  She'll  make  the  bad  sick- 
ness go  away."  Elizabeth  Ann,  who  had  not 
known  before  that  she  was  sick,  had  a  pic- 
ture of  herself  lying  in  the  little  white  coffi^pdl 


)ffiAi 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH        15 

covered  over  with  white.  .  .  .  In  a  few  min- 
utes Aunt  Frances  was  obliged  to  excuse 
hers-elf  from  her  callers  and  devote  her- 
self entirely  to  taking  care  of  Elizabeth 
Ann. 

So  one  day,  after  this  had  happened  several 
times,  Aunt  Frances  really  did  send  for  the 
doctor,  who  came  briskly  in,  just  as  Elizabeth 
Ann  had  always  seen  him,  with  his  little  square 
black  bag  smelling  of  leather,  his  sharp  eyes, 
and  the  air  of  bored  impatience  which  he  al- 
ways wore  in- that  house.  Elizabeth  Ann  was 
terribly  afraid  to  see  him,  for  she  felt  in  her 
bones  he  would  say  she  had  galloping  con- 
sumption and  would  die  before  the  leaves  cast 
a  shadow.  This  was  a  phrase  she  had  picked 
up  from  Grace,  whose  conversation,  perhaps  on 
account  of  her  asthma,  was  full  of  references 
to  early  graves  and  quick  declines. 

And  yet — did  you  ever  hear  of  such  a  case 
before  ? — although  Elizabeth  Ann  when  she  first 
stood  up  before  the  doctor  had  been  quaking 
with  fear  lest  he  discover  some  deadly  disease 


16  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

in  her,  she  was  very  much  hurt  indeed  when, 
after  thumping  her  and  looking  at  her  lower 
eyelid  inside  out,  and  listening  to  her  breathing, 
he  pushed  her  away  with  a  little  jerk  and  said : 
"There's  nothing  in  the  world  the  matter  with 
that  child.  She's  as  sound  as  a  nut!  What 
she  needs  is  .  .  .  " — he  looked  for  a  moment 
at  Aunt  Frances's  thin,  anxious  face,  with  the 
eyebrows  drawn  together  in  a  knot  of  consci- 
entiousness, and  then  he  looked  at  Aunt  Har- 
riet's thin,  anxious  face  with  the  eyebrows 
drawn  up  that  very  same  way,  and  then  he 
glanced  at  Grace's  thin,  anxious  face  peering 
from  the  door  waiting  for  his  verdict — and 
then  he  drew  a  long  breath,  shut  his  lips  and 
his  little  black  case  very  tightly,  and  did  not 
go  on  to  say  what  it  was  that  Elizabeth  Am 
needed. 

Of  course  Aunt  Frances  didn't  let  him  off  as 
easily  as  that,  you  may  be  sure.  She  fluttered 
around  him  as  he  tried  to  go,  and  she  said  all. 
sorts  of  fluttery  things  to  him,  like  "But,  Doc- 
tor, she  hasn't  gained  a  pound  in  three  months^ 


Elizabeth   Ann   stood  up  before  the   doct( 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH  17 
.  .  .  and  her  sleep  .  .  .  and  her  appetite 
.    .    .   and  her  nerves.   ..." 

The  doctor  said  back  to  her,  as  he  put  on  his 
hat,  all  the  things  doctors  always  say  under 
such  conditions:  "More  beefsteak  .  .  .  plenty 
of  fresh  air  .  .  .  more  sleep  .  .  .  she'll  be 
all  right  ..."  but  his  voice  did  not  sound 
as  though  he  thought  what  he  was  saying 
amounted  to  much.  Nor  did  Elizabeth  Ann. 
She  had  hoped  for  some  spectacular  red  pills 
to  be  taken  every  half -hour,  like  those  Grace's 
doctor  gave  her  whenever  she  felt  low  in  her 
mind. 

And  just  then  something  happened  which 
changed  Elizabeth  Ann's  life  forever  and  ever. 
It  was  a  very  small  thing,  too.  Aunt  Harriet 
coughed.  Elizabeth  Ann  did  not  think  it  at  all  a 
bad-sounding  cough  in  comparison  with  Grace's 
hollow  whoop;  Aunt  Harriet  had  been  cough- 
ing like  that  ever  since  the  cold  weather  set  in, 
for  three  or  four  months  now,  and  nobody  had 
thought  anything  of  it,  because  they  were  all 
so  much  occupied  in  taking  care  of  the  sensi- 


IS  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

tive,  nervous  little  girl  who  needed  so  much 

care. 

And  yet,  at  the  sound  of  that  little  discreet 
cough  behind  Aunt  Harriet's  hand,  the  doc- 
tor whirled  around  and  fixed  his  sharp  eyes 
on  her,  with  all  the  bored,  impatient  look 
gone,  the  first  time  Elizabeth  Ann  had  ever 
seen  him  look  interested.  ''What's  that! 
What's  that?"  he  said,  going  over  quickly  to 
Aunt  Harriet.  He  snatched  out  of  his  little 
bag  a  shiny  thing  with  two  rubber  tubes  at- 
tached, and  he  put  the  ends  of  the  tubes  in  his 
ears  and  the  shiny  thing  up  against  Aunt 
Harriet,  who  was  saying,  "It's  nothing, 
Doctor  ...  a  little  teasing  cough  I've  had 
this  winter.  And  I  meant  to  tell  you, 
too,  but  I  forgot  it,  that  that  sore  spot 
on  my  lungs  doesn't  go  away  as  it  ought 
to." 

The  doctor  motioned  her  very  impolitely  to 
stop  talking,  and  listened  very  hard  through  his 
little  tubes.  Then  he  turned  around  and  looked 
at  Aunt  Frances  as  though  he  were  angry  at 


/ 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH        19 

her.    He  said,  "Take  the  child  away  and  then 
come  back  here  yourself." 

And  that  was  almost  all  that  Elizabeth  Ann 
ever  knew  of  the  forces  which  swept  her  away 
from  the  life  which  had  always  gone  on,  re- 
volving about  her  small  person,  exactly  the 
same  ever  since  she  could  remember. 

You  have  heard  so  much  about  tears  in  the 
account  of  Elizabeth  Ann's  life  so  far  that  I 
won't  tell  you  much  about  the  few  days  which 
followed,  as  the  family  talked  over  and  hur- 
riedly prepared  to  obey  the  doctor's  verdict, 
which  was  that  Aunt  Harriet  was  very,  very 
sick  and  must  go  away  at  once  to  a  warm  cli- 
mate, and  Aunt  Frances  must  go,  too,  but  not 
Elizabeth  Ann,  for  Aunt  Frances  would  need 
to  give  all  her  time  to  taking  care  of  Aunt 
Harriet.  And  anyhow  the  doctor  didn't  think 
it  best,  either  for  Aunt  Harriet  or  for  Eliza- 
beth Ann,  to  have  them  in  the   same  house. 

Grace  couldn't  go  of  course,  but  to  every- 


20  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

body's  surprise  she  said  she  didn't  mind,  be- 
cause she  had  a  bachelor  brother,  who  kept  a 
grocery  store,  who  had  been  wanting  her  for 
years  to  go  and  keep  house  for  him.  She  said 
she  had  stayed  on  just  out  of  conscientiousness 
because  she  knew  Aunt  Harriet  couldn't  get 
along  without  her!  And  if  you  notice,  that's 
the  way  things  often  happen  to  very,  very 
conscientious  people. 

Elizabeth  Ann,  however,  had  no  grocer 
brother.  She  had,  it  is  true,  a  great  many  rela- 
tives, and  of  course  it  was  settled  she  should 
go  to  some  of  them  till  Aunt  Frances  could 
take  her  back.  For  the  time  being,  just  now, 
while  everything  was  so  distracted  and  con- 
fused, she  was  to  go  to  stay  with  the  Lathrop 
cousins,  who  lived  in  the  same  city,  although 
it  was  very  evident  that  the  Lathrops  were 
not  perfectly  crazy  with  delight  over  the  pros- 
pect. 

Still,  something  had  to  be  done  at  once, 
and  Aunt  Frances  was  so  frantic  with  the 
packing  up,  and  the  moving  men  coming  to  take 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH       21 

the  furniture  to  storage,  and  her  anxiety  over 
her  mother — she  had  switched  to  Aunt  Har- 
riet, you  see,  all  the  conscientiousness  she  had 
lavished  on  Elizabeth  Ann — nothing  much 
could  be  extracted  from  her  about  Elizabeth 
Ann.  ''Just  keep  her  for  the  present,  Molly!" 
she  said  to  Cousin  Molly  Lathrop.  "I'll  do 
something  soon.  I'll  write  you.  I'll  make 
another  arrangement  .  .  .  but  just  now.  ..." 

Her  voice  was  quavering  on  the  edge  of  tears, 
and  Cousin  Molly  Lathrop,  who  hated  scenes, 
said  hastily,  "Yes,  oh,  yes,  of  course.  For  the 
present  ..."  and  went  away,  thinking  that 
she  didn't  see  why  she  should  have  all  the  dis- 
agreeable things  to  do.  When  she  had  her 
husband's  tyrannical  old  mother  to  take  care 
of,  wasn't  that  enough,  without  adding  to  the 
household  such  a  nervous,  spoiled,  morbid 
young  one  as  Elizabeth  Ann! 

Elizabeth  Ann  did  not  of  course  for  a  mo- 
ment dream  that  Cousin  Molly  was  thinking  any 
such  things  about  her,  but  she  could  not  help 
seeing  that  Cousin  Molly  was  not  any  too  en- 


22  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

thusiastic  about  taking  her  in ;  and  she  was  al- 
ready feeling  terribly  forlorn  about  the  sud- 
den, unexpected  change  in  Aunt  Frances,  who 
had  been  so  wrapped  up  in  her  and  now  was 
just  as  much  wrapped  up  in  Aunt  Harriet. 
Do  you  know,  I  am  sorry  for  Elizabeth  Ann, 
and,  what's  more,  I  have  been  ever  since  this 
story  began. 

Well,  since  I  promised  you  that  I  was  not  go- 
ing to  tell  about  more  tears,  I  won't  say  a  sin- 
gle word  about  the  day  when  the  two  aunts 
went  away  on  the  train,  for  there  is  nothing 
much  but  tears  to  tell  about,  except  perhaps  an 
absent  look  in  Aunt  Frances's  eyes  which  hurt 
the  little  girl's  feelings  dreadfully. 

And  then  Cousin  Molly  took  the  hand  of  the 
sobbing  little  girl  and  led  her  back  to  the 
Lathrop  house.  But  if  you  think  you  are  now 
going  to  hear  about  the  Lathrops,  you  are  quite 
mistaken,  for  just  at  this  moment  old  Mrs. 
Lathrop  took  a  hand  in  the  matter.  She  was 
Cousin  Molly's  husband's  mother,  and,  of 
course,  no  relation  at  all  to  Elizabeth  Ann,  and 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH       23 

so  was  less  enthusiastic  than  anybody  else.  All 
that  Elizabeth  Ann  ever  saw  of  this  old  lady, 
who  now  turned  the  current  of  her  life  again, 
was  her  head,  sticking  out  of  a  second-story  win- 
dow; and  that's  all  that  you  need  to  know  about 
her,  either.  It  was  a  very  much  agitated  old 
head,  and  it  bobbed  and  shook  with  the  inten- 
sity with  which  the  imperative  old  voice  called 
upon  Cousin  Molly  and  Elizabeth  Ann  to  stop 
right  there  where  they  were  on  the  front  walk. 

"The  doctor  says  that  what's  the  matter 
with  Bridget  is  scarlet  fever,  and  we've  all  got 
to  be  quarantined.  There's  no  earthly  sense 
bringing  that  child  in  to  be  sick  and  have  it, 
and  be  nursed,  and  make  the  quarantine  twice 
as  long!" 

"But,  Mother!"  called  Cousin  Molly,  "I 
can't  leave  the  child  in  the  middle  of  the 
street!" 

Elizabeth  Ann  was  actually  glad  to  hear 
her  say  that,  because  she  was  feeling  so  aw- 
fully unwanted,  which  is,  if  you  think  of  it,  not 
a  very  cheerful  feeling  for  a  little  girl  who 


24  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

has  been  the  hub  round  which  a  whole  house- 
hold was  revolving. 

"You  don't  have  to!"  shouted  old  Mrs. 
Lathrop  out  of  her  second-story  window.  Al- 
though she  did  not  add  "You  gump!"  aloud, 
you  could  feel  she  was  meaning  just  that. 
"You  don't  have  to!  You  can  just  send  her  to 
the  Putney  cousins.  All  nonsense  about  her  not 
going  there  in  the  first  place.  They  invited  her 
the  minute  they  heard  of  Harriet's  being  so 
bad.  They're  the  natural  ones  to  take  her  in. 
Abigail  is  her  mother's  own  aunt,  and  Ann  is 
her  own  first-cousin-once-removed  .  .  .  just 
as  close  as  Harriet  and  Frances  are,  and  much 
closer  than  you !  And  on  a  farm  and  all  .  .  . 
just  the  place  for  her!" 

"But  how  under  the  sun,  Mother!"  shouted 
Cousin  Molly  back,  "can  I  get  her  to  the  Put- 
neys'?  You  can't  send  a  child  of  nine  a  thou- 
sand miles  without   .    .    . " 

Old  Mrs.  Lathrop  looked  again  as  though 
she  were  saying  "You  gump!"  and  said  aloud, 
"Why,  there's  James,  going  to  New  York  on 


AUNT  HARRIET  HAS  A  COUGH  25 
business  in  a  few  days  anyhow.  He  can  just 
go  now,  and  take  her  along  and  put  her  on  the 
right  train  at  Albany.  If  he  wires  from  here, 
they'll  meet  her  in  Hillsboro." 

And  that  was  just  what  happened.  Perhaps 
you  may  have  guessed  by  this  time  that  when 
old  Mrs.  Lathrop  issued  orders  they  were  usu- 
ally obeyed.  As  to  who  the  Bridget  was  who 
had  the  scarlet  fever,  I  know  no  more  than  you. 
I  take  it,  from  the  name,  she  was  the  cook.  Un- 
less, indeed,  old  Mrs.  Lathrop  made  her  up  for 
the  occasion,  which  I  think  she  would  have  been 
quite  capable  of  doing,  don't  you? 

At  any  rate,  with  no  more  ifs  or  ands,  Eliza- 
beth Ann's  satchel  was  packed,  and  Cousin 
James  Lathrop 's  satchel  was  packed,  and  the 
two  set  off  together,  the  big,  portly,  middle- 
aged  man  quite  as  much  afraid  of  his  mother 
as  Elizabeth  Ann  was.  But  he  was  going  to 
New  York,  and  it  is  conceivable  that  he  thought 
once  or  twice  on  the  trip  that  there  were  good 
times  in  New  York  as  well  as  business  engage- 


26  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ments,  whereas  poor  Elizabeth  Ann  was  being 
sent  straight  to  the  one  place  in  the  world 
where  there  were  no  good  times  at  all.  Aunt 
Harriet  had  said  so,  ever  so  many  times.  Poor 
Elizabeth  Ann! 


CHAPTER  H 
BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS 

You  can  imagine,  perhaps,  the  dreadful  ter- 
ror of  Elizabeth  Ann  as  the  train  carried  her 
along  toward  Vermont  and  the  horrible  Put- 
ney Farm!  It  had  happened  so  quickly — her 
satchel  packed,  the  telegram  sent,  the  train 
caught — that  she  had  not  had  time  to  get  her 
wits  together,  assert  herself,  and  say  that  she 
would  not  go  there!  Besides,  she  had  a  sink- 
ing notion  that  perhaps  they  wouldn't  pay  any 
attention  to  her  if  she  did.  The  world  had 
come  to  an  end  now  that  Aunt  Frances  wasn't 
there  to  take  care  of  her!  Even  in  the  most 
familiar  air  she  could  only  half  breathe  with- 
out Aunt  Frances !  And  now  she  was  not  even 
being  taken  to  the  Putney  Farm !  She  was  be- 
ing sent ! 

She  shrank  together  in  her  seat,  more  and 

27 


28  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

more  frightened  as  the  end  of  her  journey  came 
nearer,  and  looked  out  dismally  at  the  winter 
landscape,  thinking  it  hideous  with  its  brown 
bare  fields,  its  brown  bare  trees,  and  the  quick- 
running  little  streams  hurrying  along,  swollen 
with  the  January  thaw  which  had  taken  all  the 
snow  from  the  hills.  She  had  heard  her  elders 
say  about  her  so  many  times  that  she  could  not 
stand  the  cold,  that  she  shivered  at  the  very 
thought  of  cold  weather,  and  certainly  nothing 
could  look  colder  than  that  bleak  country  into 
which  the  train  was  now  slowly  making  its  way. 

The  engine  puffed  and  puffed  with  great, 
laboring  breaths  that  shook  Elizabeth  Ann's 
diaphragm  up  and  down,  but  the  train  moved 
more  and  more  slowly.  Elizabeth  Ann  could 
feel  under  her  feet  how  the  floor  of  the  car  was 
tipped  up  as  it  crept  along  the  steep  incline. 
"Pretty  stiff  grade  here?"  said  a  passenger  to 
the  conductor. 

"You  bet!"  he  assented.  "But  Hillsboro  is 
the  next  station  and  that's  at  the  top  of  the 
hill.    We  go  down  after  that  to  Rutland. ' '    He 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  29 

turned  to  Elizabeth  Ann — "Say,  little  girl, 
didn't  your  uncle  say  you  were  to  get  off  at 
Hillsboro?  You'd  better  be  getting  your  things 
together. ' ' 

Poor  Elizabeth  Ann's  knees  knocked  against 
each  other  with  fear  of  the  strange  faces  she 
was  to  encounter,  and  when  the  conductor  came 
to  help  her  get  off,  he  had  to  carry  the  white, 
trembling  child  as  well  as  her  satchel.  But 
there  was  only  one  strange  face  there, — not 
another  soul  in  sight  at  the  little  wooden  sta- 
tion. A  grim-faced  old  man  in  a  fur  cap  and 
heavy  coat  stood  by  a  lumber  wagon. 

"This  is  her,  Mr.  Putney,"  said  the  con- 
ductor, touching  his  cap,  and  went  back  to  the 
train,  which  went  away  shrieking  for  a  nearby 
crossing  and  setting  the  echoes  ringing  from 
one  mountain  to  another. 

There  was  Elizabeth  Ann  alone  with  her 
much-feared  Great-uncle  Henry.  He  nodded 
to  her,  and  drew  out  from  the  bottom  of  the 
wagon  a  warm,  large  cape,  which  he  slipped 
over  her  shoulders.    ''The  women  folks  were 


30  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

afraid  you'd  git  cold  drivin',"  he  explained. 
He  then  lifted  her  high  to  the  seat,  tossed  her 
satchel  into  the  wagon,  climbed  up  himself,  and 
clucked  to  his  horses.  Elizabeth  Ann  had  al- 
Avays  before  thought  it  an  essential  part  of 
railway  journeys  to  be  much  kissed  at  the  end 
and  asked  a  great  many  times  how  you  had 
"stood  the  trip." 

She  sat  very  still  on  the  high  lumber  seat, 
feeling  very  forlorn  and  neglected.  Her  feet 
dangled  high  above  the  floor  of  the  wagon. 
She  felt  herself  to  be  in  the  most  dangerous 
place  she  had  ever  dreamed  of  in  her  worst 
dreams.  Oh,  why  wasn't  Aunt  Frances  there 
to  take  care  of  her !  It  was  just  like  one  of  her 
bad  dreams — yes,  it  was  horrible!  She  would 
fall,  she  would  roll  under  the  wheels  and  be 
crushed  to  .  .  .  She  looked  up  at  Uncle  Henry 
with  the  wild,  strained  eyes  of  nervous  terror 
which  always  brought  Aunt  Frances  to  her  in 
a  rush  to  "hear  all  about  it,"  to  sympathize,  to 
reassure. 

Uncle   Henry  looked  down   at  her  soberly, 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  31 

his  hard,  weather-beaten  old  face  quite  un- 
moved. "Here,  you  drive,  will  you,  for  a 
piece?"  he  said  briefly,  putting  the  reins  into 
her  hands,  hooking  his  spectacles  over  his 
ears,  and  drawing  out  a  stubby  pencil  and  a  bit 
of  paper.  "I've  got  some  figgering  to  do. 
You  pull  on  the  left-hand  rein  to  make  'em  go 
to  the  left  and  t'other  way  for  t'other  way, 
though  'tain't  likely  we'll  meet  any  teams." 

Elizabeth  Ann  had  been  so  near  one  of  her 
wild  screams  of  terror  that  now,  in  spite  of  her 
instant  absorbed  interest  in  the  reins,  she  gave 
a  queer  little  yelp.  She  was  all  ready  with 
the  explanation,  her  conversations  with  Aunt 
Frances  having  made  her  very  fluent  in  ex- 
planations of  her  own  emotions.  She  would 
tell  Uncle  Henry  about  how  scared  she  had 
been,  and  how  she  had  just  been  about  to  scream 
and  couldn't  keep  back  that  one  little  .  .  . 
But  Uncle  Henry  seemed  not  to  have  heard  her 
little  howl,  or,  if  he  had,  didn't  think  it  worth 
conversation,  for  he  .  .  .  oh,  the  horses  were 
certainly  going  to  one  side!     She  hastily  de- 


32  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

cided  which  was  her  right  hand  (she  had  never 
been  forced  to  know  it  so  quickly  before)  and 
pulled  furiously  on  that  rein.  The  horses 
turned  their  hanging  heads  a  little,  and,  miracu- 
lously, there  they  were  in  the  middle  of  the 
road  again. 

Elizabeth  Ann  drew  a  long  breath  of  relief 
and  pride,  and  looked  to  Uncle  Henry  for 
praise.  But  he  was  busily  setting  down  figures 
as  though  he  were  getting  his  'rithmetic  lesson 
for  the  next  day  and  had  not  noticed  .  .  .  Oh, 
there  they  were  going  to  the  left  again!  This 
time,  in  her  flurry,  she  made  a  mistake  about 
which  hand  was  which  and  pulled  wildly  on 
the  left  line!  The  horses  docilely  walked  off 
the  road  into  a  shallow  ditch,  the  wagon  tilted 
.  .  .  help!  Why  didn't  Uncle  Henry  help! 
Uncle  Henry  continued  intently  figuring  on  the 
back  of  his  envelope. 

Elizabeth  Ann,  the  perspiration  starting  out 
on  her  forehead,  pulled  on  the  other  line.  The 
horses  turned  back  up  the  little  slope,  the 
wheel  grated  sickeningly  against  the  wagon- 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  33 

box — she  was  sure  they  would  tip  over!  But 
there!  somehow  there  they  were  in  the  road, 
safe  and  sound,  with  Uncle  Henry  adding  up 
a  column  of  figures.  If  he  only  knew,  thought 
the  little  girl,  if  he  only  knew  the  danger  he 
had  been  in,  and  how  he  had  been  saved  .  .  . ! 
But  she  must  think  of  some  way  to  remember, 
for  sure,  which  her  right  hand  was,  and  avoid 
that  hideous  mistake  again. 

And  then  suddenly  something  inside  Eliza- 
beth Ann's  head  stirred  and  moved.  It  came 
to  her,  like  a  clap,  that  she  needn't  know  which 
was  right  or  left  at  all.  If  she  just  pulled  the 
way  she  wanted  them  to  go — the  horses  would 
never  know  whether  it  was  the  right  or  the  left 
rein ! 

It  is  possible  that  what  stirred  inside  her 
head  at  that  moment  was  her  brain,  waking 
up.  She  was  nine  years  old,  and  she  was 
in  the  third  A  grade  at  school,  but  that  was  the 
first  time  she  had  ever  had  a  whole  thought  of 
her  very  own.  At  home,  Aunt  Frances  had  al- 
ways known  exactly  what  she  was  doing,  and 


34  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

had  helped  h^r  over  the  hard  places  before 
she  even  knew  they  were  there;  and  at  school 
her  teachers  had  been  carefully  trained  to 
think  faster  than  the  scholars.  Somebody  had 
always  been  explaining*  things  to  Elizabeth 
Ann  so  industriously  that  she  had  never  found 
out  a  single  thing'' for  herself  before.  This  was 
a  very  small  discovery,  but  an  original  one. 
Elizabeth  Ann  was  as  excited  about  it  as  a 
mother-bird  over  the  first   egg  that  hatches. 

She  forgot  how  afraid  she  was  of  Uncle 
Henry,  and  poured  out  to  him  her  discovery. 
"It's  not  right  or  left  that  matters!"  she 
ended  triumphantly;  "it's  which  way  you 
want  to  go!"  Uncle  Henry  looked  at  her  at- 
tentively as  she  talked,  eyeing  her  sidewise 
over  the  top  of  one  spectacle-glass.  When  she 
finished — "Well,  now,  that's  so,"  he  admitted, 
and  returned  to  his  arithmetic. 

It  was  a  short  remark,  shorter  than  any 
Elizabeth  Ann  had  ever  heard  before.  Aunt 
Frances  and  her  teachers  always  explained 
matters  at  length.    But  it  had  a  weighty,  satis- 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  35 

fying  ring  to  it.  The  little  girl  felt  the  im- 
portance of  having  her  statement  recognized. 
She  turned  back  to  her  driving. 

The  slow,  heavy  plow  horses  had  stopped  dur- 
ing her  talk  with  Uncle  Henry.  They  stood  as 
still  now  as  though  their  feet  had  grown  to  the 
road.  Elizabeth  Ann  looked  up  at  the  old  man 
for  instructions.  But  he  was  deep  in  his  figures. 
She  had  been  taught  never  to  interrupt  people, 
so  she  sat  still  and  waited  for  him  to  tell  her 
what  to  do. 

But,  although  they  were  driving  in  the  midst 
of  a  winter  thaw,  it  was  a  pretty  cold  day, 
with  an  icy  wind  blowing  down  the  back  of 
her  neck.  The  early  winter  twilight  was  begin- 
ning to  fall,  and  she  felt  rather  empty.  She  grew 
very  tired  of  waiting,  and  remembered  how 
the  grocer's  boy  at  home  had  started  his  horse. 
Then,  summoning  all  her  courage,  with  an  ap- 
prehensive glance  at  Uncle  Henry's  arith- 
metical silence,  she  slapped  the  reins  up  and 
down  on  the  horses'  backs  and  made  the  best 
imitation  she  could  of  the  grocer's  boy's  cluck. 


36  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

The  horses  lifted  their  heads,  they  leaned  for- 
ward, they  put  one  foot  before  the  other  .•  .  . 
they  were  off!  The  color  rose  hot  on  Eliza- 
beth Ann's  happy  face.  If  she  had  started  a 
big  red  automobile  she  would  not  have  been 
prouder.  For  it  was  the  first,  thing  she  had 
ever  done  all  herself  .  .  .  every  bit  .  .  . 
every  smitch!  She  had  thought  of  it  and  she 
had  done  it.    And  it  had  worked ! 

Now  for  what  seemed  to  her  a  long,  long 
time  she  drove,  drove  so  hard  she  could  think 
of  nothing  else.  She  guided  the  horses  around 
stones,  she  cheered  them  through  freezing  mud- 
puddles  of  melted  snow,  she  kept  them  in  the 
anxiously  exact  middle  of  the  road.  She  was 
quite  astonished  when  Uncle  Henry  put  his 
pencil  and  paper  away,  took  the  reins  from  her 
hands,  and  drove  into  a  yard,  on  one  side  of 
which  was  a  little  low  white  house  and  on  the 
other  a  big  red  barn.  He  did  not  say  a  word, 
but  she  guessed  that  this  was  Putney  Farm. 

Two  women  in  gingham  dresses  and  white 
aprons  came  out  of  the  house.     One  was  old 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  37 

and  one  might  be  called  young,  just  like  Aunt 
Harriet  and  Aunt  Frances.  But  they  looked 
very  different  from  those  aunts.  The  dark- 
haired  one  was  very  tall  and  strong-looking, 
and  the  white-haired  one  was  very  rosy  and 
fat.  They  both  looked  up  at  the  little,  thin, 
white-faced  girl  on  the  high  seat,  and  smiled. 
"Well,  Father,  you  got  her,  I  see,"  said  the 
brown-haired  one.  She  stepped  up  to  the 
wagon  and  held  up  her  arms  to  the  child. 
"Come  on,  Betsy,  and  get  some  supper,"  she 
said,  as  though  Elizabeth  Ann  had  lived  there 
all  her  life  and  had  just  driven  into  town  and 
back. 

And  that  was  the  arrival  of  Elizabeth  Ann 
at  Putney  Farm. 

The  brown-haired  one  took  a  long,  strong 
step  or  two  and  swung  her  up  on  the  porch. 
"You  take  her  in,  Mother,"  she  said.  "I'll 
help  Father  unhitch." 

The  fat,  rosy,  white-haired  one  took  Eliza- 
beth Ann's  skinny,  cold  little  hand  in  her  soft 
warm,  fat  one,  and  led  her  along  to  the  open 


38  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

kitchen  door.  "I'm  your  Aunt  Abigail,"  she 
said.  "Your  mother's  aunt,  you  know.  And 
that's  your  Cousin  Ann  that  lifted  you  down, 
and  it  was  your  Uncle  Henry  that  brought  you 
out  from  town."  She  shut  the  door  and  went 
on,  "I  don't  know  if  your  Aunt  Harriet  ever 
happened  to  tell  you  about  us,  and  so  .    .    ." 

Elizabeth  Ann  interrupted  her  hastily,  the 
recollection  of  all  Aunt  Harriet's  remarks 
vividly  before  her.  ' '  Oh  yes,  oh  yes ! ' '  she  said. 
"She  always  talked  about  you.  She  talked 
about  you  a  lot,  she  .  .  ."  The  little  girl  ■ 
stopped  short  and  bit  her  lip. 

If  Aunt  Abigail  guessed  from  the  expression 
on  Elizabeth  Ann's  face  what  kind  of  talking 
Aunt  Harriet 's  had  been,  she  showed  it  only  by 
a  deepening  of  the  wrinkles  all  around  her 
eyes.  She  said,  gravely:  "Well,  that's  a  good 
thing.  You  know  all  about  us  then."  She 
turned  to  the  stove  and  took  out  of  the  oven 
a  pan  of  hot  baked  beans,  very  brown  and 
crispy  on  top  (Elizabeth  Ann  detested  beans), 
and  said,  over  her  shoulder,  ' '  Take  your  things 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  39 

off,  Betsy,  and  hang  'em  on  that  lowest  hook 
back  of  the  door.    That's  your  hook." 

The  little  girl  fumbled  forlornly  with  the 
fastenings  of  her  cape  and  the  buttons  of  her 
coat.  At  home,  Aunt  Frances  or  Grace  had  al- 
ways taken  off  her  wraps  and  put  them  away 
for  her.  When,  very  sorry  for  herself,  she 
turned  away  from  the  hook,  Aunt  Abigail  said : 
"Now  you  must  be  cold.  Pull  a  chair  right  up 
here  by  the  stove."  She  was  stepping  around 
quickly  as  she  put  supper  on  the  table.  The 
floor  shook  under  her.  She  was  one  of  the  fat- 
test people  Elizabeth  Ann  had  ever  seen.  After 
living  with  Aunt  Frances  and  Aunt  Harriet 
and  Grace  the  little  girl  could  scarcely  believe 
her  eyes.     She  stared  and  stared. 

Aunt  Abigail  seemed  not  to  notice  this.  In- 
deed, she  seemed  for  the  moment  to  have  for- 
gotten all  about  the  new-comer.  Elizabeth  Ann 
sat  on  the  wooden  chair,  her  feet  hanging  (she 
had  been  taught  that  it  was  not  manners  to  put 
her  feet  on  the  rungs),  looking  about  her  with 
miserable,  homesick  eyes.    What  an  ugly,  low- 


40  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ceilinged  room,  with  only  a  couple  of  horrid 
kerosene  lamps  for  light;  and  they  didn't  keep 
any  girl,  evidently ;  and  they  were  going  to  eat 
right  in  the  kitchen  like  poor  people;  and  no- 
body spoke  to  her  or  looked  at  her  or  asked  her 
how  she  had  "stood  the  trip";  and  here  she 
was,  millions  of  miles  away  from  Aunt  Fran- 
ces, without  anybody  to  take  care  of  her.  She 
began  to  feel  the  tight  place  in  her  throat 
which,  by  thinking  about  hard,  she  could  al- 
ways turn  into  tears,  and  presently  her  eyes 
began  to  water. 

Aunt  Abigail  was  not  looking  at  her  at  all, 
but  she  now  stopped  short  in  one  of  her  rushes 
to  the  table,  set  down  the  butter-plate  she 
was  carrying,  and  said  "There!"  as  though 
she  had  forgotten  something.  She  stooped — 
it  was  perfectly  amazing  how  spry  she  was — 
and  pulled  out  from  under  the  stove  a  half- 
grown  kitten,  very  sleepy,  yawning  and  stretch- 
ing, and  blinking  its  eyes.  "There,  Betsy!" 
said  Aunt  Abigail,  putting  the  little  yellow  and 
white  ball  into  the  child's  lap.    "There  is  one 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  41 

of  old  Whitey's  kittens  that  didn't  get  given 
away  last  summer,  and  she  pesters  the  life  out 
of  me.  I've  got  so  much  to  do.  When  I  heard 
you  were  coming,  I  thought  maybe  you  would 
take  care  of  her  for  me.  If  you  want  to, 
enough  to  bother  to  feed  her  and  all,  you  can 
have  her  for  your  own." 

Elizabeth  Ann  bent  her  thin  face  over  the 
warm,  furry,  friendly  little  animal.  She  could 
not  speak.  She  had  always  wanted  a  kitten, 
but  Aunt  Frances  and  Aunt  Harriet  and  Grace 
had  always  been  sure  that  cats  brought  diph- 
theria and  tonsilitis  and  all  sorts  of  dread- 
ful diseases  to  delicate  little  girls.  She  was 
afraid  to  move  for  fear  the  little  thing  would 
jump  down  and  run  away,  but  as  she  bent  cau- 
tiously toward  it  the  necktie  of  her  middy  blouse 
fell  forward  and  the  kitten  in  the  middle  of  a 
yawn  struck  swiftly  at  it  with  a  soft  paw. 
Then,  still  too  sleepy  to  play,  it  turned  its 
head  and  began  to  lick  Elizabeth  Ann's  hand 
with  a  rough  little  tongue.  Perhaps  you  can 
imagine  how  thrilled  the  little  girl  was  at  this ! 


42  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

She  held  her  hand  perfectly  still  until  the  kitten 
stopped  and  began  suddenly  washing  its  own 
face,  and  then  she  put  her  hands  under  it  and 
very  awkwardly  lifted  it  up,  burying  her  face 
in  the  soft  fur.  The  kitten  yawned  again,  and 
from  the  pink-lined  mouth  came  a  fresh,  milky 
breath.  "Oh!"  said  Elizabeth  Ann  under  her 
breath.  "Oh,  you  darling!"  The  kitten  looked 
at  her  with  bored,  speculative  eyes. 

Elizabeth  Ann  looked  up  now  at  Aunt  Abi- 
gail and  said,  "What  is  its  name,  please?" 
But  the  old  woman  was  busy  turning  over  a 
griddle  full  of  pancakes  and  did  not  hear.  On 
the  train  Elizabeth  Ann  had  resolved  not  to 
call  these  hateful  relatives  by  the  same  name 
she  had  for  dear  Aunt  Frances,  but  she  now 
forgot  that  resolution  and  said,  again,  "Oh, 
Aunt  Abigail,  what  is  its  name?" 

Aunt  Abigail  faced  her  blankly.  "Name?" 
she  asked.  "Whose  ...  oh,  the  kitten's? 
Goodness,  child,  I  stopped  racking  my  brain 
for  kitten  names  sixty  years  ago.  Name  it 
yourself.    It's  yours." 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  43 

Elizabeth  Ann  had  already  named  it  in  her 
own  mind,  the  name  she  had  always  thought 
she  would  call  a  kitten  by,  if  she  ever  had 
one.  It  was  Eleanor,  the  prettiest  name  she 
knew. 

Aunt  Abigail  pushed  a  pitcher  toward  her. 
"There's  the  cat's  saucer  under  the  sink. 
Don't  you  want  to  give  it  some  milk?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  got  down  from  her  chair, 
poured  some  milk  into  the  saucer,  and  called: 
"Here,  Eleanor!  Here,  Eleanor!" 

Aunt  Abigail  looked  at  her  sharply  out  of 
the  corner  of  her  eye  and  her  lips  twitched,  but 
a  moment  later  her  face  was  immovably  grave 
as  she  carried  the  last  plate  of  pancakes  to  the 
table. 

Elizabeth  Ann  sat  on  her  heels  for  a  long 
time,  watching  the  kitten  lap  the  milk,  and  she 
was  surprised,  when  she  stood  up,  to  see 
that  Cousin  Ann  and  Uncle  Henry  had 
come  in,  very  red-cheeked  from  the  cold 
air. 

"Well,  folks,"   said  Aunt  Abigail,   "don't 


44  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

you  think  we've  done  some  lively  stepping 
around,  Betsy  and  I,  to  get  supper  all  on  the 
table  for  you?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  stared.  What  did  Aunt  Abi- 
gail mean?  She  hadn't  done  a  thing  about  get- 
ting supper!  But  nobody  made  any  comment, 
and  they  all  took  their  seats  and  began  to  eat. 
Elizabeth  Ann  was  astonishingly  hungry,  and 
she  thought  she  could  never  get  enough  of  the 
creamed  potatoes,  cold  ham,  hot  cocoa,  and 
pancakes.  She  was  very  much  relieved  that 
her  refusal  of  beans  caused  no  comment.  Aunt 
Frances  had  always  tried  very  hard  to  make 
her  eat  beans  because  they  have  so  much 
protein  in  them,  and  growing  children  need 
protein.  Elizabeth  Ann  had  heard  this  said  so 
many  times  she  could  have  repeated  it  back- 
ward, but  it  had  never  made  her  hate  beans 
any  the  less.  However,  nobody  here  seemed  to 
know  this,  and  Elizabeth  Ann  kept  her  knowl- 
edge to  herself.  They  had  also  evidently  never 
heard  how  delicate  her  digestion  was,  for  she 
never  saw  anything  like  the  number  of  pan- 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  45 

cakes  they  let  her  eat.  All  she  wanted!  She 
had  never  heard  of  such  a  thing ! 

They  still  did  not  ask  her  how  she  had 
"stood  the  trip."  They  did  not  indeed  ask 
her  much  of  anything  or  pay  very  much  atten- 
tion to  her  beyond  filling  her  plate  as  fast  as 
she  emptied  it.  In  the  middle  of  the  meal 
Eleanor  came,  jumped  into  her  lap,  and  curled 
down,  purring.  After  this  Elizabeth  Ann  kept 
one  hand  on  the  little  soft  ball,  handling  her 
fork  with  the  other. 

After  supper — well,  Elizabeth  Ann  never 
knew  what  did  happen  after  supper  until  she 
felt  somebody  lifting  her  and  carrying  her  up- 
stairs. It  was  Cousin  Ann,  who  carried  her  as 
lightly  as  though  she  were  a  baby,  and  who 
said,  as  she  sat  down  on  the  floor  in  a  slant- 
ceilinged  bedroom,  "You  went  right  to  sleep 
with  your  head  on  the  table.  I  guess  you're 
pretty  tired." 

Aunt  Abigail  was  sitting  on  the  edge  of  a 
great  wide  bed  with  four  posts,  and  a  curtain 
around  the  top.     She  was  partly  undressed, 


40  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

and  was  undoing  her  hair  and  brushing  it  out. 
It  was  very  curly  and  all  fluffed  out  in  a  shin- 
ing white  fuzz  around  her  fat,  pink  face,  full 
of  soft  wrinkles;  but  in  a  moment  she  was 
braiding  it  up  again  and  putting  on  a  tight 
white  nightcap,  which  she  tied  under  her  chin. 
/rWe  got  the  word  about  your  coming  so 
late,"  said  Cousin  Ann,  "that  we  didn't  have 
time  to  fix  you  up  a  bedroom  that  can  be 
warmed.  So  you're  going  to  sleep  in  here  for 
a  while.  The  bed's  big  enough  for  two,  I  guess, 
even  if  they  are  as  big  as  you  and  Mother." 

Elizabeth  Ann  stared  again.  What  queer 
things  they  said  here.  She  wasn't  nearly  as 
big  as  Aunt  Abigail! 

"Mother,  did  yeu  put  Shep  out?"  asked 
Cousin  Ann ;  and  when  Aunt  Abigail  said,  "  No ! 
There!  I  forgot  to!"  Cousin  Ann  went  away; 
and  that  was  the  last  of  her.  They  certainly 
believed  in  being  saving  of  their  words  at 
Putney  Farm. 

Elizabeth  Ann  began  to  undress.  She  was 
only  half-awake;  and  that  made  her  feel  only 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  47 

about  half  her  age,  which  wasn't  very  great, 
the  whole  of  it,  and  she  felt  like  just  crooking 
her  arm  over  her  eyes  and  giving  up !  She  was 
too  forlorn!  She  had  never  slept  with  any- 
body before,  and  she  had  heard  ever  so  many 
times  how  bad  it  was  for  children  to  sleep  with 
grown-ups.  An  icy  wind  rattled  the  windows 
and  puffed  in  around  the  loose  old  casings. 
On  the  window-sill  lay  a  little  wreath  of  snow. 
Elizabeth  Ann  shivered  and  shook  on  her  thin 
legs,  undressed  in  a  hurry,  and  slipped  into 
her  night-dress.  She  felt  just  as  cold  inside  as 
out,  and  never  was  more  utterly  miserable  than 
in  that  strange,  ugly  little  room,  with  that 
strange,  queer,  fat  old  woman.  She  was  even 
too  miserable  to  cry,  and  that  is  saying  a  great 
deal  for  Elizabeth  Ann! 

She  got  into  bed  first,  because  Aunt  Abigail 
said  she  was  going  to  keep  the  candle  lighted 
for  a  while  and  read.  "And  anyhow,"  she 
said,  "I'd  better  sleep  on  the  outside  to  keep 
you  from  rolling  out." 

Elizabeth  Ann  and  Aunt  Abigail  lay  very 


48  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

still  for  a  long  time,  Aunt  Abigail  reading  out 
of  a  small,  worn  old  book.  Elizabeth  Ann 
could  see  its  title,  "Essays  of  Emerson."  A 
book  with  that  name  had  always  laid  on  the 
center  table  in  Aunt  Harriet's  house,  but  that 
copy  was  all  new  and  shiny,  and  Elizabeth  Ann 
had  never  seen  anybody  look  inside  it.  It  was 
a  very  dull-looking  book,  with  no  pictures  and 
no  conversation.  The  little  girl  lay  on  her 
back,  looking  up  at  the  cracks  in  the  plaster 
ceiling  and  watching  the  shadows  sway  and 
dance  as  the  candle  flickered  in  the  gusts  of 
cold  air.  She  herself  began  to  feel  a  soft, 
pervasive  warmth.  Aunt  Abigail's  great  body 
was  like  a  stove. 

It  was  very,  very  quiet,  quieter  than  any 
place  Elizabeth  Ann  had  ever  known,  except 
church,  because  a  trolley-line  ran  past  Aunt 
Harriet's  house  and  even  at  night  there  were 
always  more  or  less  bangings  and  rattlings. 
Here  there  was  not  a  single  sound  except  the 
soft,  whispery  noise  when  Aunt  Abigail  turned 
over  a  page  as  she  read  steadily  and  silently 


'Do  jou  know,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  "I  think  it's  going  to  be  real 
nice,  having  a  little  girl  in  the  house  again." 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  49 

forward  in  her  book.  Elizabeth  Ann  turned 
her  head  so  that  she  couid  see  the  round,  rosy 
old  face,  full  of  soft  wrinkles,  and  the  calm, 
steady  old  eyes  which  were  fixed  on  the  page. 
And  as  she  lay  there  in  the  warm  bed,  watch- 
ing that  quiet  face,  something  very  queer  be- 
gan to  happen  to  Elizabeth  Ann.  She  felt  as 
though  a  tight  knot  inside  her  were  slowly 
being  untied.  She  felt — what  was  it  she  felt! 
There  are  no  words  for  it.  From  deep  within 
her  something  rose  up  softly  .  .  .  she  drew 
one  or  two  long,  half-sobbing  breaths.   .    .    . 

Aunt  Abigail  laid  down  her  book  and  looked 
over  at  the  child.  "Do  you  know,"  she  said,  in 
a  conversational  tone,  "do  you  know,  I  think 
it's  going  to  be  real  nice,  having  a  little  girl  in 
the  house  again. " 

Oh,  then  the  tight  knot  in  the  little  unwanted 
girl's  heart  was  loosened  indeed!  It  all  gave 
way  at  once,  and  Elizabeth  Ann  burst  suddenly 
into  hot  tears — yes,  I  know  I  said  I  would  not 
tell  you  any  more  about  her  crying;  but  these 
tears  were  very  different  from  any  she  had 


50  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ever  shed  before.  And  they  were  the  last,  too, 
for  a  long,  long  time. 

Aunt  Abigail  said,  ''Well,  well!"  and  mov- 
ing over  in  bed  took  the  little  weeping  girl 
into  her  arms.  She  did  not  say  another  word 
then,  but  she  put  her  soft,  withered  old  cheek 
close  against  Elizabeth  Ann's,  till  the  sobs 
began  "to  grow  less,  and  then  she  said:  "I  hear 
your  kitty  crying  outside  the  door.  Shall  I 
let  her  in?  I  expect  she'd  like  to  sleep  with 
you.    I  guess  there's  room  for  three  of  us." 

She  got  out  of  bed  as  she  spoke  and  walked 
across  the  room  to  the  door.  The  floor  shook 
under  her  great  bulk,  and  the  peak  of  her  night- 
cap made  a  long,  grotesque  shadow.  But  as 
she  came  back  with  the  kitten  in  her  arms 
Elizabeth  Ann  saw  nothing  funny  in  her  looks. 
She  gave  Eleanor  to  the  little  girl  and  got  into 
bed  again.  "There,  now,  I  guess  we're  ready 
for  the  night,"  she  said.  "You  put  the  kitty 
on  the  other  side  of  you  so  she  won't  fall  out 
of  bed." 

She  blew  the  light  out  and  moved  over  a  lit- 


BETSY  HOLDS  THE  REINS  51 

tie  closer  to  Elizabeth  Ann,  who  immediately 
was  enveloped  in  that  delicious  warmth.  The 
kitten  curled  up  under  the  little  girl's  chin. 
Between  her  and  the  terrors  of  the  dark  room 
loomed  the  rampart  of  Aunt  Abigail's  great 
body. 

Elizabeth  Ann  drew  a  long,  long  breath  .  .  . 
and  when  she  opened  her  eyes  the  sun  was 
shining  in  at  the  window. 


CHAPTER  m 

A  SHORT  MORNING 

Aunt  Abigail  was  gone,  Eleanor  was  gone. 
The  room  was  quite  empty  except  for  the 
bright  sunshine  pouring  in  through  the  small- 
paned  windows.  Elizabeth  Ann  stretched  and 
yawned  and  looked  about  her.  What  funny 
wall-paper  it  was — so  old-fashioned  looking! 
The  picture  was  of  a  blue  river  and  a  brown 
mill,  with  green  willow-trees  over  it,  and  a  man 
with  sacks  on  his  horse's  back  stood  in  front 
of  the  mill.  This  picture  was  repeated  a  great 
many  times,  all  over  the  paper;  and  in  the 
corner,  where  it  hadn't  come  out  even,  they 
had  had  to  cut  it  right  down  the  middle  of 
the  horse.  It  was  very  curious-looking.  She 
stared  at  it  a  long  time,  waiting  for  somebody 
to  tell  her  when  to  get  up.  At  home  Aunt 
Frances  always  told  her,  and  helped  her  get 

52 


A  SHORT  MORNING  53 

dressed.  But  here  nobody  came.  She  discov- 
ered that  the  heat  came  from  a  hole  in  the  floor 
near  the  bed,  which  opened  down  into  the  room 
below.  From  it  came  a  warm  breath  of  bak- 
ing bread  and  a  muffled  thump  once  in  a 
while. 

The  sun  rose  higher  and  higher,  and  Eliza- 
beth Ann  grew  hungrier  and  hungrier.  Finally 
it  occurred  to  her  that  it  was  not  absolutely 
necessary  to  have  somebody  tell  her  to  get  up. 
She  reached  for  her  clothes  and  began  to 
dress.  When  she  had  finished  she  went  out 
into  the  hall,  and  with  a  return  of  her  ag- 
grieved, abandoned  feeling  (you  must  remem- 
ber that  her  stomach  was  very  empty)  she  be- 
gan to  try  to  find  her  way  downstairs.  She 
soon  found  the  steps,  went  down  them  one  at 
a  time,  and  pushed  open  the  door  at  the  foot. 
Cousin  Ann,  the  brown-haired  one,  was  ironing 
near  the  stove.  She  nodded  and  smiled  as  the 
child  came  into  the  room,  and  said,  "Well,  you 
must  feel  rested!'' 

"Oh,    I    haven't    been    asleep!"    explained 


54.  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Elizabeth  Ann.    "I  was  waiting  for  somebody 

to  tell  me  to  get  up." 

"Oh,"  said  Cousin  Ann,  opening  her  black 
eyes  a  little.  ' '  Were  you  ? ' '  She  said  no  more 
than  this,  but  Elizabeth  Ann  decided  hastily 
that  she  would  not  add,  as  she  had  been  about 
to,  that  she  was  also  waiting  for  somebody  to 
help  her  dress  and  do  her  hair.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  she  had  greatly  enjoyed  doing  her  own 
hair — the  first  time  she  had  ever  tried  it.  It 
had  never  occurred  to  Aunt  Frances  that  her 
little  baby-girl  had  grown  up  enough  to  be  her 
own  hairdresser,  nor  had  it  occurred  to  Eliza- 
beth Ann  that  this  might  be  possible.  But  as 
she  struggled  with  the  snarls  she  had  had  a 
sudden  wild  idea  of  doing  it  a  different  way 
from  the  pretty  fashion  Aunt  Frances  always 
followed.  Elizabeth  Ann  had  always  secretly 
envied  a  girl  in  her  class  whose  hair  was  all 
tied  back  from  her  face,  with  one  big  knot  in 
her  ribbon  at  the  back  of  her  neck.  It  looked 
so  grown-up.  And  this  morning  she  had  done 
hers  that  way,  turning  her  neck  till  it  ached, 


A  SHORT  MORNING  55 

so  that  she  could  see  the  coveted  tight  effect 
at  the  back.  And  still — aren't  little  girls  queer? 
—although  she  had  enjoyed  doing  her  own  hair, 
she  was  very  much  inclined  to  feel  hurt  be- 
cause Cousin  Ann  had  not  come  to  do  it  for 
her. 

Cousin  Ann  set  her  iron  down  with  the  soft 
thump  which  Elizabeth  Ann  had  heard  up- 
stairs. She  began  folding  a  napkin,  and  said : 
"Now  reach  yourself  a  bowl  off  the  shelf  yon- 
der. The  oatmeal's  in  that  kettle  on  the  stove 
and  the  milk  is  in  the  blue  pitcher.  If  you 
want  a  piece  of  bread  and  butter,  here 's  a  new 
loaf  just  out  of  the  oven,  and  the  butter's  in 
that  brown  crock." 

Elizabeth  Ann  followed  these  instructions 
and  sat  down  before  this  quickly  assembled 
breakfast  in  a  very  much  surprised  silence.  At 
home  it  took  the  girl  more  than  half  an  hour 
to  get  breakfast  and  set  the  table,  and  then 
she  had  to  wait  on  them  besides.  She  began 
to  pour  the  milk  out  of  the  pitcher  and 
stopped  suddenly.    "Oh,  I'm  afraid  I've  taken 


56  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

more  than  my  share!"  she  said  apologeti- 
cally. 

Cousin  Ann  looked  up  from  her  rapidly  mov- 
ing iron,  and  said,  in  an  astonished  voice: 
"Your  share?    What  do  you  mean?" 

"My  share  of  the  quart,"  explained  Eliza- 
beth Ann.  At  home  they  bought  a  quart  of 
milk  and  a  cup  of  cream  every  day,  and  they 
were  all  very  conscientious  about  not  taking 
more  than  their  due  share. 

"Good  land,  child,  take  all  the  milk  you 
want!"  said  Cousin  Ann,  as  though  she  found 
something  shocking  in  what  the  little  girl  had 
just  said.  Elizabeth  Ann  thought  to  herself 
that  she  spoke  as  though  milk  ran  out  of  a 
faucet,  like  water. 

She  was  very  fond  of  milk,  and  she  made  a 
very  good  breakfast  as  she  sat  looking  about 
the  low-ceilinged  room.  It  was  unlike  any 
room  she  had  ever  seen. 

It  was,  of  course,  the  kitchen,  and  yet  it 
didn't  seem  possible  that  the  same  word  could 
be  applied  to  that  room  and  the  small,  dark 


A  SHORT  MORNING  57 

cubby-hole  which  had  been  Grace's  asthmatical 
kingdom.  This  room  was  very  long  and  nar- 
row, and  all  along  one  side  were  windows  with 
white,  ruffled  curtains  drawn  back  at  the  sides, 
and  with  small,  shining  panes  of  glass,  through 
which  the  sun  poured  a  golden  flood  of  light  on 
a  long  shelf  of  potted  plants  that  took  the 
place  of  a  window-sill.  The  shelf  was  covered 
with  shining  white  oil-cloth,  the  pots  were  of 
clean  reddish  brown,  the  sturdy,  stocky  plants 
of  bright  green  with  clear  red-and-white  flow- 
ers. Elizabeth  Ann's  eyes  wandered  all  over 
the  kitchen  from  the  low,  white  ceiling  to  the 
clean,  bare  wooden  floor,  but  they  always  came 
back  to  those  sunny  windows.  Once,  back  in 
the  big  brick  school-building,  as  she  had  sat 
drooping  her  thin  shoulders  over  her  desk, 
some  sort  of  a  procession  had  gone  by  with  a 
brass  band  playing  a  lively  air.  For  some 
queer  reason,  every  time  she  now  glanced  at 
that  sheet  of  sunlight  and  the  bright  flowers 
she  had  a  little  of  the  same  thrill  which  had 
straightened  her  back  and  gone  up  and  down 


58  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

her  spine  while  the  band  was  playing.  Possi- 
bly Annt  Frances  was  right,  after  all,  and 
Elizabeth  Ann  was  a  very  impressionable  child. 
I  wonder,  by  the  way,  if  anybody  ever  saw  a 
child  who  wasn't. 

At  one  end,  the  end  where  Cousin  Ann  was 
ironing,  stood  the  kitchen  stove,  gleaming  black, 
with  a  tea-kettle  humming  away  on  it,  a  big 
hot-water  boiler  near  it,  and  a  large  kitchen 
cabinet  with  lots  of  drawers  and  shelves  and 
hooks  and  things.  Beyond  that,  in  the  middle  of 
the  room,  was  the  table  where  they  had  had  sup- 
per last  night,  and  at  which  the  little  girl  now 
sat  eating  her  very  late  breakfast ;  and  beyond 
that,  at  the  other  end  of  the  room,  was  another 
table  with  an  old  dark-red  cashmere  shawl  on 
it  for  a  cover.  A  large  lamp  stood  in  the  mid- 
dle of  this,  a  bookcase  near  it,  two  or  three 
rocking-chairs  around  it,  and  back  of  it,  against 
the  wall,  was  a  wide  sofa  covered  with  bright 
cretonne,  with  three  bright  pillows.  Something 
big  and  black  and  woolly  was  lying  on  this 
sofa,  snoring  loudly.    As  Cousin  Ann  saw  the 


A  SHORT  MORNING  59 

little  girl's  fearful  glance  alight  on  this  she  ex- 
plained: "That's  Shep,  our  old  dog.  Doesn't 
he  make  an  awful  noise!  Mother  says,  when 
she  happens  to  be  alone  here  in  the  evening, 
it's  real  company  to  hear  Shep  snore — as  good 
as  having  a  man  in  the  house." 

Although  this  did  not  seem  at  all  a  sensible 
remark  to  Elizabeth  Ann,  who  thought  soberly 
to  herself  that  she  didn't  see  why  snoring 
made  a  dog  as  good  as  a  man,  still  she  was 
acute  enough  (for  she  was  really  quite  an  in- 
telligent little  girl)  to  feel  that  it  belonged  in 
the  same  class  of  remarks  as  one  or  two  others 
she  had  noted  as  "queer"  in  the  talk  at  Put- 
ney Farm  last  night.  This  variety  of  talk  was 
entirely  new  to  her,  nobody  in  Aunt  Harriet's 
conscientious  household  ever  making  anything 
but  plain  statements  of  fact.  It  was  one  of  the 
' '  queer  Putney  ways ' '  which  Aunt  Harriet  had 
forgotten  to  mention.  It  is  possible  that  Aunt 
Harriet  had  never  noticed  it. 

When  Elizabeth  Ann  finished  her  breakfast, 
Cousin  Ann  made  three  suggestions,  using  ex- 


60  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

actly  the  same  accent  for  them  all.  She  said: 
"  Wouldn't  you  better  wash  your  dishes  up  now 
before  they  get  sticky!  And  don't  you  want  one 
of  those  red  apples  from  the  dish  on  the  side 
table?  And  then  maybe  you'd  like  to  look 
around  the  house  so's  to  know  where  you  are." 
Elizabeth  Ann  had  never  washed  a  dish  in  all 
her  life,  and  she  had  always  thought  that  no- 
body but  poor,  ignorant  people,  who  couldn't  af- 
ford to  hire  girls,  did  such  things.  And  yet  (it 
was  odd)  she  did  not  feel  like  saying  this  to 
Cousin  Ann,  who  stood  there  so  straight  in  her 
gingham  dress  and  apron,  with  her  clear,  bright 
eyes  and  red  cheeks.  Besides  this  feeling, 
Elizabeth  Ann  was  overcome  with  embarrass- 
ment at  the  idea  of  undertaking  a  new  task 
in  that  casual  way.  How  in  the  world  did  you 
wash  dishes?  She  stood  rooted  to  the  spot,  ir- 
resolute, horribly  shy,  and  looking,  though  she 
did  not  know  it,  very  clouded  and  sullen. 
Cousin  Ann  said  briskly,  holding  an  iron  up  to 
her  cheek  to  see  if  it  was  hot  enough:  "Just 
take  them  over  to  the  sink  there  and  hold  them 


A  SHORT  MORNING  61 

under  the  hot-water  faucet.  They'll  be  clean 
in  no  time.  The  dish-towels  are  those  hanging 
on  the  rack  over  the  stove." 

Elizabeth  Ann  moved  promptly  over  to  the 
sink,  as  though  Cousin  Ann's  words  had  shoved 
her  there,  and  before  she  knew  it,  her  saucer, 
cup,  and  spoon  were  clean  and  she  was  wiping 
them  on  a  dry  checked  towel.  "The  spoon 
goes  in  the  side-table  drawer  with  the  other 
silver,  and  the  saucer  and  cup  in  those  shelves 
there  behind  the  glass  doors  where  the  china 
belongs,"  continued  Cousin  Ann,  thumping 
hard  with  her  iron  on  a  napkin  and  not  look- 
ing up  at  all,  "and  don't  forget  your  apple  as 
you  go  out.  Those  Northern  Spies  are  just 
getting  to  be  good  about  now.  When  they  first 
come  off  the  tree  in  October  you  could  shoot 
them  through  an  oak  plank." 

Now  Elizabeth  Ann  knew  that  this  was  a 
foolish  thing  to  say,  since  of  course  an 
apple  never  could  go  through  a  board;  but 
something  that  had  always  been  sound  asleep 
in  her  brain  woke  up  a  little,  little  bit  and 


62  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

opened  one  eye.  For  it  occurred  dimly  to 
Elizabeth  Ann  that  this  was  a  rather  funny  way 
of  saying  that  Northern  Spies  were  very  hard 
when  you  first  pick  them  in  the  autumn.  She 
had  to  figure  it  out  for  herself  very  slowly,  be- 
cause it  was  a  new  idea  to  her,  and  she  was  half- 
way through  her  tour  of  inspection  of  the  house 
before  there  glimmered  on  her  lips,  in  a  faint 
smile,  the  first  recognition  of  humor  in  all  her 
life.  She  felt  a  momentary  impulse  to  call 
down  to  Cousin  Ann  that  she  saw  the  point,  but 
before  she  had  taken  a  single  step  toward  the 
head  of  the  stairs  she  had  decided  not  to  do 
this.  Cousin  Ann,  with  her  bright,  dark  eyes, 
and  her  straight  back,  and  her  long  arms,  and 
her  way  of  speaking  as  though  it  never  oc- 
curred to  her  that  you  wouldn't  do  just  as  she 
said — Elizabeth  Ann  was  not  very  sure  that 
she  liked  Cousin  Ann,  and  she  was  very  sure 
that  she  was  afraid  of  her. 

So  she  went  on,  walking  from  one  room  to 
another,  industriously  eating  the  red  apple,  the 
biggest  she  had  ever  seen.    It  was  the  best,  too, 


A  SHORT  MORNING  63 

with  its  crisp,  white  flesh  and  the  delicious, 
sour-sweet  juice  which  made  Elizabeth  Ann  feel 
with  each  mouthful  like  hurrying  to  take 
another.  She  did  not  think  much  more  of  the 
other  rooms  in  the  house  than  she  had  of  the 
kitchen.  There  were  no  draped  ' '  throws ' '  over 
anything;  there  were  no  lace  curtains  at  the 
windows,  just  dotted  Swiss  like  the  kitchen;  all 
the  ceilings  were  very  low;  the  furniture  was 
all  of  dark  wood  and  very  old-looking;  what 
few  rugs  there  were  were  of  bright-colored 
rags;  the  mirrors  were  queer  and  old,  with 
funny  old  pictures  at  the  top;  there  wasn't  a 
brass  bed  in  any  of  the  bedrooms,  just  old 
wooden  ones  with  posts,  and  curtains  round  the 
tops;  and  there  was  not  a  single  plush  por- 
tiere in  the  parlor,  whereas  at  Aunt  Harriet's 
there  had  been  two  sets  for  that  one  room. 
She  was  relieved  at  the  absence  of  a  piano 
and  secretly  rejoiced  that  she  would  not  need 
to  practise.  In  her  heart  she  had  not  liked  her 
music  lessons  at  all,  but  she  had  never  dreamed 
of  not  accepting  them  from  Aunt  Frances  as 


64  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

she  accepted  everything  else.  Also  she  had 
liked  to  hear  Aunt  Frances  boast  about  how 
much  better  she  could  play  than  other  children 
of  her  age. 

She  was  downstairs  by  this  time,  and,  open- 
ing a  door  out  of  the  parlor,  found  herself 
back  in  the  kitchen,  the  long  line  of  sunny  win- 
dows and  the  bright  flowers  giving  her  that 
quick  little  thrill  again.  Cousin  Ann  looked  up 
from  her  ironing,  nodded,  and  said:  "All 
through?  You'd  better  come  in  and  get  warmed 
up.  Those  rooms  get  awfully  cold  these  Janu- 
ary days.  Winters  we  mostly  use  this  room 
so's  to  get  the  good  of  the  kitchen  stove." 
She  added  after  a  moment,  during  which  Eliza- 
beth Ann  stood  by  the  stove,  warming  her 
hands:  "There's  one  place  you  haven't  seen 
yet — the  milk-room.  Mother's  down  there 
now,  churning.  That's  the  door — the  middle 
one." 

Elizabeth  Ann  had  been  wondering  and  won- 
dering where  in  the  world  Aunt  Abigail  was. 
So  she  stepped  quickly  to  the  door,  and  went 


A  SHORT  MORNING  65 

down  the  cold  dark  stairs  she  found  there. 
At  the  bottom  was  a  door,  locked  apparently, 
for  she  could  find  no  fastening.  She  heard 
steps  inside,  the  door  was  briskly  cast  open, 
and  she  almost  fell  into  the  arms  of  Aunt 
Abigail,  who  caught  her  as  she  stumbled  for- 
ward, saying:  "Well,  I've  been  expectin'  you 
down  here  for  a  long  time.  I  never  saw  a  lit- 
tle girl  yet  who  didn't  like  to  watch  butter- 
making.  Don't  you  love  to  run  the  butter- 
worker  over  it?  I  do,  myself,  for  all  I'm  sev- 
enty-two ! ' ' 

"I  don't  know  anything  about  it,"  said 
Elizabeth  Ann.  "I  don't  know  what  you  make 
butter  out  of.    We  always  bought  ours." 

"Well,  for  goodness'  sokes!"  said  Aunt  Abi- 
gail. She  turned  and  called  across  the  room, 
"Henry,  did  you  ever!  Here's  Betsy  saying 
she  don't  know  what  we  make  butter  out  of! 
She  actually  never  saw  anybody  making  but- 
ter!" 

Uncle  Henry  was  sitting  down,  near  the  win- 
dow,  turning   the   handle   to    a   small   barrel 


66  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

swung  between  two  uprights.  He  stopped  for 
a  moment  and  considered  Aunt  Abigail's  re- 
mark with  the  same  serious  attention  he  had 
given  to  Elizabeth  Ann's  discovery  about  left 
and  right.  Then  he  began  to  turn  the  churn 
over  and  over  again  and  said,  peaceably :  "Well, 
Mother,  you  never  saw  anybody  laying  asphalt 
pavement,  I'll  warrant  you!  And  I  suppose 
Betsy  knows  all  about  that." 

Elizabeth  Ann's  spirits  rose.  She  felt  very 
superior  indeed.  "Oh,  yes,"  she  assured  them, 
"I  know  all  about  that!  Didn't  you  ever  see 
anybody  doing  that?  Why,  I've  seen  them 
hundreds  of  times!  Every  day  as  we  went  to 
school  they  were  doing  over  the  whole  pave- 
ment for  blocks  along  there." 

Aunt  Abigail  and  Uncle  Henry  looked  at  her 
with  interest,  and  Aunt  Abigail  said:  "Well, 
now,  think  of  that!    Tell  us  all  about  it!" 

"Why,  there's  a  big  black  sort  of  wagon," 
began  Elizabeth  Ann,  "and  they  run  it  up  and 
down  and  pour  out  the  black  stuff  on  the  road. 
And  that's  all  there  is  to  it."     She  stopped, 


A  SHORT  MORNING  67 

rather  abruptly,  looking  uneasy.  Uncle  Henry 
inquired:  "Now  there's  one  thing  I've  always 
wanted  to  know.  How  do  they  keep  that  stuff 
from  hardening  on  them?  How  do  they  keep 
it  hot?" 

The  little  girl  looked  blank.  "Why,  a  fire,  I 
suppose,"  she  faltered,  searching  her  memory 
desperately  and  finding  there  only  a  dim  recol- 
lection of  a  red  glow  somewhere  connected  with 
the  familiar  scene  at  which  she  had  so  often 
looked  with  unseeing  eyes. 

"Of  course  a  fire,"  agreed  Uncle  Henry. 
"But  what  do  they  burn  in  it,  coke  or  coal  or 
wood  or  charcoal?  And  how  do  they  get  any 
draft  to  keep  it  going?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  shook  her  head.  "I  never 
noticed,"  she  said. 

Aunt  Abigail  asked  her  now,  "What  do 
they  do  to  the  road  before  they  pour  it 
on?" 

"  Do  ? "  said  Elizabeth  Ann.  < '  I  didn  't  know 
they  did  anything." 

"Well,  they  can't  pour  it  right  on  a  dirt 


68  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

road,  can  they?"  asked  Aunt  Abigail.  " Don't 
they  put  down  cracked  stone  or  some- 
thing?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  looked  down  at  her  toes.  "I 
never  noticed,"  sh    said. 

"I  wonder  how  long  it  takes  for  it  to 
harden?"  said  Uncle  Henry. 

"I  never  noticed,"  said  Elizabeth  Ann,  in  a 
small  voice. 

Uncle  Henry  said,  "Oh!"  and  stopped  asking 
questions.  Aunt  Abigail  turned  away  and  put 
a  stick  of  wood  in  the  stove.  Elizabeth  Ann 
did  not  feel  very  superior  now,  and  when  Aunt 
Abigail  said,  "Now  the  butter's  beginning  to 
come.  Don't  you  want  to  watch  and  see  every- 
thing I  do,  so's  you  can  answer  if  anybody 
asks  you  how  butter  is  made?"  Elizabeth  Ann 
understood  perfectly  what  was  in  Aunt's  Abi- 
gail's mind,  and  gave  to  the  process  of  butter- 
making  a  more  alert  and  aroused  attention 
than  she  had  ever  before  given  to  anything.  It 
was  so  interesting,  too,  that  in  no  time  she  for- 
got why  she  was  watching,  and  was  absorbed 


What's  the  matter,  Molly?     What's  the  matter?" 


A  SHORT  MORNING  69 

in  the  fascinations  of  the  dairy  for  their  own 
sake. 

She  looked  in  the  churn  as  Aunt  Abigail  un- 
screwed the  top,  and  saw  the  thick,  sour  cream 
separating  into  buttermilk  and  tiny  golden 
particles.  "It's  gathering,"  said  Aunt  Abi- 
gail, screwing  the  lid  back  on.  "Father '11 
churn  it  a  little  more  till  it  really  comes.  And 
you  and  I  will  scald  the  wooden  butter  things 
and  get  everything  ready.  You'd  better  take 
that  apron  there  to  keep  your  dress  clean." 

Wouldn't  Aunt  Frances  have  been  astonished 
if  she  could  have  looked  in  on  Elizabeth  Ann 
that  very  first  morning  of  her  stay  at  the  hate- 
ful Putney  Farm  and  have  seen  her  wrapped 
in  a  gingham  apron,  her  face  bright  with  in- 
terest, trotting  here  and  there  in  the  stone- 
floored  milk-room!  She  was  allowed  the  ex- 
citement of  pulling  out  the  plug  from  the  bot- 
tom of  the  churn,  and  dodged  back  hastily  to 
escape  the  gush  of  buttermilk  spouting  into 
the  pail  held  by  Aunt  Abigail.  And  she  poured 
the  water  in  to  wash  the  butter,  and  screwed 


70  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

on  the  top  herself,  and,  again  all  herself  (for 
Uncle  Henry  had  gone  oft"  as  soon  as  the  but- 
ter had  "come"),  swung  the  barrel  back  and 
forth  six  or  seven  times  to  swish  the  water  all 
through  the  particles  of  butter.  She  even 
helped  Aunt  Abigail  scoop  out  the  great  yel- 
low lumps — her  imagination  had  never  con- 
ceived of  so  much  butter  in  all  the  world! 
Then  Aunt  Abigail  let  her  run  the  curiously 
shaped  wooden  butter-worker  back  and  forth 
over  the  butter,  squeezing  out  the  water,  and 
then  pile  it  up  again  with  her  wooden  paddle 
into  a  mound  of  gold.  She  weighed  out  the 
salt  needed  on  the  scales,  and  was  very  much 
surprised  to  find  that  there  really  is  such  a 
thing  as  an  ounce.  She  had  never  met  it  be- 
fore outside  the  pages  of  her  arithmetic  book 
and  she  didn't  know  it  lived  anywhere  else. 

After  the  salt  was  worked  in  she  watched 
Aunt  Abigail's  deft,  wrinkled  old  hands  make 
pats  and  rolls.  It  looked  like  the  greatest  fun, 
and  too  easy  for  anything;  and  when  Aunt 
Abigail  asked  her  if  she  wouldn't  like  to  make 


A  SHORT  MORNING  71 

up  the  last  half-pound  into  a  pat  for  dinner, 
she  took  up  the  wooden  paddle  confidently. 
And  then  she  got  one  of  the  surprises  that  Put- 
ney Farm  seemed  to  have  for  her.  She  discov- 
ered that  her  hands  didn't  seem  to  belong  to 
her  at  all,  that  her  fingers  were  all  thumbs,  that 
she  didn't  seem  to  know  in  the  least  before- 
hand how  hard  a  stroke  she  was  going  to  give 
nor  which  way  her  fingers  were  going  to  go.  It 
was,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  first  time  Eliza- 
beth Ann  had  tried  to  do  anything  with  her 
hands  except  to  write  and  figure  and  play  on 
the  piano,  and  naturally  she  wasn't  very  well 
acquainted  with  them.  She  stopped  in  dismay, 
looking  at  the  shapeless,  battered  heap  of  but- 
ter before  her  and  holding  out  her  hands  as 
though  they  were  not  part  of  her. 

Aunt  Abigail  laughed,  took  up  the  paddle, 
and  after  three  or  four  passes  the  butter  was 
a  smooth,  yellow  ball.  "Well,  that  brings  it 
all  back  to  me!"  she  said — "when  I  was  a 
little  girl,  when  my  grandmother  first  let  me 
try  to  make  a  pat.    I  was  about  five  years  old — 


72  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

my !  what  a  mess  I  made  of  it !  And  I  remem- 
ber— doesn't  it  seem  funny — that  she  laughed 
and  said  her  Great-aunt  Elmira  had  taught 
her  how  to  handle  butter  right  here  in  this  very 
milk-room.  Let's  see,  Grandmother  was  born 
the  year  the  Declaration  of  Independence  was 
signed.  That's  quite  a  while  ago,  isn't  it? 
But  butter  hasn't  changed  much,  I  guess,  nor 
little  girls  either." 

Elizabeth  Ann  listened  to  this  statement  with 
a  very  queer,  startled  expression  on  her  face, 
as  though  she  hadn't  understood  the  words. 
Now  for  a  moment  she  stood  staring  up  in 
Aunt  Abigail's  face,  and  yet  not  seeing  her  at 
all,  because  she  was  thinking  so  hard.  She 
was  thinking!  "Why!  There  were  real  peo- 
ple living  when  the  Declaration  of  Independ- 
ence was  signed — real  people,  not  just  history 
people — old  women  teaching  little  girls  how  to 
do  things — right  in  this  very  room,  on  this 
very  floor — and  the  Declaration  of  Independ- 
ence just  signed!" 

To  tell  the  honest  truth,  although  she  had 


A  SHORT  MORNING  ? 

passed  a  very  good  examination  in  the  little 
book  on  American  history  they  had  studied  in 
school,  Elizabeth  Ann  had  never  to  that  mo- 
ment had  any  notion  that  there  ever  had  been 
really  and  truly  any  Declaration  of  Independ- 
ence at  all.  It  had  been  like  the  ounce,  living 
exclusively  inside  her  schoolbooks  for  little 
girls  to  be  examined  about.  And  now  here 
Aunt  Abigail,  talking  about  a  butter-pat,  had 
brought  it  to  life ! 

Of  course  all  this  only  lasted  a  moment,  be- 
cause it  was  such  a  new  idea!  She  soon  lost 
track  of  what  she  was  thinking  of;  she  rubbed 
her  eyes  as  though  she  were  coming  out  of  a 
dream,  she  thought,  confusedly:  "What  did 
butter  have  to  do  with  the  Declaration  of  Inde- 
pendence? Nothing,  of  course!  It  couldn't!" 
and  the  whole  impression  seemed  to  pass  out 
of  her  mind.  But  it  was  an  impression  which 
was  to  come  again  and  again  during  the  neyt 
few  months. 


CHAPTER  IV 
BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL 

Elizabeth  Ann  was  very  much  surprised  to 
hear  Cousin  Ann's  voice  calling,  "Dinner!" 
down  the  stairs.  It  did  not  seem  possible  that 
the  whole  morning  had  gone  by.  "Here,"  said 
Aunt  Abigail,  "just  put  that  pat  on  a  plate, 
will  you,  and  take  it  upstairs  as  you  go.  I've 
got  all  I  can  do  to  haul  my  own  two  hundred 
pounds  up,  without  any  half-pound  of  butter 
into  the  bargain."  The  little  girl  smiled  at 
this,  though  she  did  not  exactly  know  why,  and 
skipped  up  the  stairs  proudly  with  her  butter. 

Dinner  was  smoking  on  the  table,  which  was 
set  in  the  midst  of  the  great  pool  of  sunlight. 
A  very  large  black-and-white  dog,  with  a  great 
bushy  tail,  was  walking  around  and  around  the 
table,  suiffing  the  air.  He  looked  as  big  as  a 
bear  to  Elizabeth  Ann;  and  as  he  walked  his 

74 


BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL  75 

great  red  tongue  hung  out  of  his  mouth  and  his 
white  teeth  gleamed  horribly.  Elizabeth  Ann 
shrank  back  in  terror,  clutching  her  plate  of 
butter  to  her  breast  with  tense  fingers.  Cousin 
Ann  said,  over  her  shoulder:  "Oh,  bother! 
There's  old  Shep,  got  up  to  pester  us  begging 
for  scraps!  Shep!  You  go  and  lie  down  this 
minute ! ' ' 

To  Elizabeth  Ann's  astonishment  and  im- 
mense relief,  the  great  animal  turned,  droop- 
ing his  head  sadly,  walked  back  across  the 
floor,  got  upon  the  couch  again,  and  laid  his 
head  down  on  one  paw  very  forlornly,  turning 
up  the  whites  of  his  eyes  meekly  at  Cousin 
Ann. 

Aunt  Abigail,  who  had  just  pulled  herself  up 
the  stairs,  panting,  said,  between  laughing  and 
puffing:  "I'm  glad  I'm  not  an  animal  on  this 
farm.  Ann  does  boss  them  around  so. "  "  Well, 
somebody  has  to!"  said  Cousin  Ann,  advanc- 
ing on  the  table  with  a  platter.  This  proved 
to  have  chicken  fricassee  on  it,  and  Elizabeth 
Ann's  heart  melted  in  her  at  the  smell.     She 


76  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

loved  chicken  gravy  on  hot  biscuits  beyond 
anything  in  the  world,  but  chickens  are  so  ex- 
pensive when  you  buy  them  in  the  market  that 
Aunt  Harriet  hadn't  had  them  very  often  for 
dinner.  And  there  was  a  plate  of  biscuits, 
golden  brown,  just  coming  out  of  the'  oven! 
She  sat  down  very  quickly,  her  mouth  water- 
ing, and  attacked  with  extreme  haste  the  big 
plateful  of  food  which  Cousin  Ann  passed 
her. 

At  Aunt  Harriet's  she  had  always  been 
aware  that  everybody  watched  her  anxiously  as 
she  ate,  and  she  had  heard  so  much  about  her 
light  appetite  that  she  felt  she  must  live  up  to 
her  reputation,  and  had  a  very  natural  and 
human  hesitation  about  eating  all  she  wanted 
when  there  happened  to  be  something  she 
liked  very  much.  But  nobody  here  knew  that 
she  "only  ate  enough  to  keep  a  bird  alive," 
and  that  her  "appetite  was  so  capricious!" 
Nor  did  anybody  notice  her  while  she  stowed 
away  the  chicken  and  gravy  and  hot  biscuits 
and  currant  jelly  and  baked  potatoes  and  ap- 


BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL  77 

pie  pie— when  did  Elizabeth  Ann  ever  eat  such 
a  meal  before !  She  actually  felt  her  belt  grow 
tight. 

In  the  middle  of  the  meal  Cousin  Ann  got 
up  to  answer  the  telephone,  which  was  in  the 
next  room.  The  instant  the  door  had  closed 
behind  her  Uncle  Henry  leaned  forward, 
tapped  Elizabeth  Ann  on  the  shoulder,  and 
nodded  toward  the  sofa.  His  eyes  were  twin- 
kling, and  as  for  Aunt  Abigail  she  began  to 
laugh  silently,  shaking  all  over,  her  napkin  at 
her  mouth  to  stifle  the  sound.  Elizabeth  Ann 
turned  wonderingly  and  saw  the  old  dog  cau- 
tiously and  noiselessly  letting  himself  down 
from  the  sofa,  one  ear  cocked  rigidly  in  the 
direction  of  Cousin  Ann's  voice  in  the  next 
room.  "The  old  tyke!"  said  Uncle  Henry. 
"He  always  sneaks  up  to  the  table  to  be  fed 
if  Ann  goes  out  for  a  minute.  Here,  Betsy, 
you're  nearest,  give  him  this  piece  of  skin 
from  the  chicken  neck."  The  big  dog  padded 
forward  across  the  room,  evidently  in  such  a 
state  of  terror  about  Cousin  Ann  that  Eliza- 


78  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

beth  Ann  felt  for  him.  She  had  a  fellow-feel- 
ing about  that  relative  of  hers.  Also  it  was  im- 
possible to  be  afraid  of  so  abjectly  meek  and 
guilty  an  animal.  As  old  Shep  came  up  to  her, 
poking  his  nose  inquiringly  on  her  lap,  she 
shrinkingly  held  out  the  big  piece  of  skin,  and 
though  she  jumped  back  at  the  sudden  snap 
and  gobbling  gulp  with  which  the  old  dog 
greeted  the  tidbit,  she  could  not  but  sympathize 
with  his  evident  enjoyment  of  it.  He  waved 
his  bushy  tail  gratefully,  cocked  his  head  on 
one  side,  and,  his  ears  standing  up  at  attention, 
his  eyes  glistening  greedily,  he  gave  a  little, 
begging  whine.  "Oh,  he's  asking  for  more!" 
cried  Elizabeth  Ann,  surprised  to  see  how 
plainly  she  could  understand  dog-talk.  ' '  Quick, 
Uncle  Henry,  give  me  another  piece!" 

Uncle  Henry  rapidly  transferred  to  her  plate 
a  wing-bone  from  his  own,  and  Aunt  Abigail, 
with  one  deft  swoop,  contributed  the  neck  from 
the  platter.  As  fast  as  she  could,  Elizabeth 
Ann  fed  these  to  Shep,  who  woofed  them  down 
at  top  speed,  the  bones  crunching  loudly  under 


BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL  79 

his  strong,  white  teeth.  How  he  did  enjoy  it! 
It  did  your  heart  good  to  see  his  gusto ! 

There  was  the  sound  of  the  telephone  re- 
ceiver being  hung  up  in  the  next  room — and 
everybody  acted  at  once.  Aunt  Abigail  began 
drinking  innocently  out  of  her  coffee-cup,  only 
her  laughing  old  eyes  showing  over  the  rim; 
Uncle  Henry  buttered  a  slice  of  bread  with  a 
grave  face,  as  though  he  were  deep  in  conjec- 
tures about  who  would  be  the  next  President; 
and  as  for  old  Shep,  he  made  one  plunge  across 
the  room,  his  toe-nails  clicking  rapidly  on  the 
bare  floor,  sprang  up  on  the  couch,  and  when 
Cousin  Ann  opened  the  door  and  came  in  he 
was  lying  in  exactly  the  position  in  which  she 
had  left  him,  his  paw  stretched  out,  his  head 
laid  on  it,  his  brown  eyes  turned  up  meekly  so 
that  the  whites  showed. 

I've  told  you  what  these  three  did,  but  I 
haven't  told  you  yet  what  Elizabeth  Ann  did. 
And  it  is  worth  telling.  As  Cousin  Ann  stepped 
in,  glancing  suspiciously  from  her  sober-faced 
and  abstracted  parents  to  the  lamb-like  inno- 


80  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

cence  of  old  Shep,  little  Elizabeth  Ann  burst  into 
a  shout  of  laughter.  It's  worth  telling  about, 
because,  so  far  as  I  know,  that  was  the  first  time 
she  had  ever  laughed  out  heartily  in  all  her  life. 
For  my  part,  I'm  half  surprised  to  know  that 
she  knew  how. 

Of  course,  when  she  laughed,  Aunt  Abigail 
had  to  laugh  too,  setting  down  her  coffee-cup 
and  showing  all  the  funny  wrinkles  in  her  face 
screwed  up  hard  with  fun ;  and  that  made  Un- 
cle Henry  laugh,  and  then  Cousin  Ann  laughed 
and  said,  as  she  sat  down,  "You  are  bad  chil- 
dren, the  whole  four  of  you!"  And  old  Shep, 
seeing  the  state  of  things,  stopped  pretending 
to  be  meek,  jumped  down,  and  came  lumbering- 
over  to  the  table,  wagging  his  tail  and  laugh- 
ing too;  you  know  that  good,  wide  dog-smile! 
He  put  his  head  on  Elizabeth  Ann's  lap  again 
and  she  patted  it  and  lifted  up  one  of  his  big 
black  ears.  She  had  quite  forgotten  that  she 
was  terribly  afraid  of  big  dogs. 

After  dinner  Cousin  Ann  looked  up  at  the 
clock  and  said:  "My  goodness!  Betsy '11  be  late 


BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL  81 

for  school  if  she  doesn't  start  right  off."  She 
explained  to  the  child,  aghast  at  this  sudden 
thunderclap,  "I  let  you  sleep  this  morning  as 
long  as  you  wanted  to,  because  you  were  so 
tired  from  your  journey.  But  of  course  there's 
no  reason  for  missing  the  afternoon  session." 

As  Elizabeth  Ann  continued  sitting  perfectly 
still,  frozen  with  alarm,  Cousin  Ann  jumped  up 
briskly,  got  the  little  coat  and  cap,  helped  her 
up,  and  began  inserting  the  child's  arms  into 
the  sleeves.  She  pulled  the  cap  well  down  over 
Elizabeth  Ann's  ears,  felt  in  the  pocket  and 
pulled  out  the  mittens.  "  There,"  she  said, 
holding  them  out,  "you'd  better  put  them  on 
before  you  go  out,  for  it's  a  real  cold  day.  As 
she  led  the  stupefied  little  girl  along  toward  the 
door  Aunt  Abigail  came  after  them  and  put  a 
big  sugar-cookie  into  the  child 's  hand.  '  -  Maybe 
you'll  like  to  eat  that  for  your  recess  time," 
she  said.  "I  always  did  when  I  went  to 
school. ' ' 

Elizabeth  Ann's  hand  closed  automatically 
about  the  cookie,  but  she  scarcely  heard  what 


82  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

was  said.  She  felt  herself  to  be  in  a  bad  dream. 
Aunt  Frances  had  never,  no  never,  let  her  go 
to  school  alone,  and  on  the  first  day  of  the  year 
always  took  her  to  the  new  teacher  and  intro- 
duced her  and  told  the  teacher  how  sensitive 
she  was  and  how  hard  to  understand ;  and  then 
she  stayed  there  for  an  hour  or  two  till  Elizabeth 
Ann  got  used  to  things !  She  could  not  face  a 
whole  new  school  all  alone — oh,  she  couldn't, 
she  wouldn't!  She  couldn't!  Horrors!  Here 
she  was  in  the  front  hall — she  was  on  the  porch ! 
Cousin  Ann  was  saying:  "Now  run  along,  child. 
Straight  down  the  road  till  the  first  turn  to  the 
left,  and  there  in  the  cross-roads,  there  you 
are."  And  now  the  front  door  closed  behind 
her,  the  path  stretched  before  her  to  the  road, 
and  the  road  led  down  the  hill  the  way  Cousin 
Ann  had  pointed.  Elizabeth  Ann's  feet  began 
to  move  forward  and  carried  her  down  the 
path,  although  she  was  still  crying  out  to  her- 
self, "I  can't!    I  won't!    I  can't!" 

Are    you    wondering    why    Elizabeth    Ann 
didn't  turn  right  around,  open  the  front  door, 


BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL  83 

walk  in,  and  say,  "  I  can 't !    I  won 't !    I  can 't ! " 
to  Cousin  Ann? 

The  answer  to  that  question  is  that  she  didn't 
do  it  because  Cousin  Ann  was  Cousin  Ann. 
And  there's  more  in  that  than  you  think!  In 
fact,  there  is  a  mystery  in  it  that  nobody  has 
ever  solved,  not  even  the  greatest  scientists 
and  philosophers,  although,  like  all  scientists 
and  philosophers,  they  think  they  have  gone  a 
long  way  toward  explaining  something  they 
don't  understand  by  calling  it  a  long  name. 
The  long  name  is  "personality,"  and  what  it 
means  nobody  knows,  but  it  is  perhaps  the  very 
most  important  thing  in  the  world  for  all  that. 
And  yet  we  know  only  one  or  two  things  about 
it.  We  know  that  anybody's  personality  is 
made  up  of  the  sum  total  of  all  the  actions  and 
thoughts  and  desires  of  his  life.  And  we  know 
that  though  there  aren't  any  words  or  any  fig- 
ures in  any  language  to  set  down  that  sum 
total  accurately,  still  it  is  one  of  the  first  things 
that  everybody  knows  about  anybody  else.  And 
that  is  really  all  we  know! 


84  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

So  I  can't  tell  you  why  Elizabeth  Ann  did 
not  go  back  and  cry  and  sob  and  say  she 
couldn't  and  she  wouldn't  and  she  couldn't,  as 
she  would  certainly  have  done  at  Aunt  Har- 
riet's. You  remember  that  I  could  not  even 
tell  you  why  it  was  that,  as  the  little  fatherless 
and  motherless  girl  lay  in  bed  looking  at  Aunt 
Abigail's  old  face,  she  should  feel  so  comforted 
and  protected  that  she  must  needs  break  out 
crying.  No,  all  I  can  say  is  that  it  was  because 
Aunt  Abigail  was  Aunt  Abigail.  But  perhaps 
it  may  occur  to  you  that  it's  rather  a  good 
idea  to  keep  a  sharp  eye  on  your  "personal- 
ity, ' '  whatever  that  is !  It  might  be  very  handy, 
you  know,  to  have  a  personality  like  Cousin 
Ann's  which  sent  Elizabeth  Ann's  feet  down 
the  path;  or  perhaps  you  would  prefer  one 
like  Aunt  Abigail's.    Well,  take  your  choice. 

You  must  not,  of  course,  think  for  a  moment 
that  Elizabeth  Ann  had  the  slightest  intention 
of  obeying  Cousin  Ann.  No  indeed!  Nothing 
was  farther  from  her  mind  as  her  feet  carried 


BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL  85 

her  along  the  path  and  into  the  road.  In  her 
mind  was  nothing  but  rebellion  and  fear  and 
anger  and  oh,  snch  hurt  feelings !  She  turned 
sick  at  the  very  thought  of  facing  all  the  star- 
ing, curious  faces  in  the  playground  turned  on 
the  new  scholar  as  she  had  seen  them  at  home ! 
She  would  never,  never  do  it !  She  would  walk 
around  all  the  afternoon,  and  then  go  back  and 
tell  Cousin  Ann  that  she  couldn't!  She  would 
explain  to  her  how  Aunt  Frances  never  let  her 
go  out  of  doors  without  a  loving  hand  to  cling 
to.  She  would  explain  to  her  how  Aunt  Fran- 
ces always  took  care  of  her!  ...  it  was 
easier  to  think  about  what  she  would  say  and 
do  and  explain,  away  from  Cousin  Ann,  than  it 
was  to  say  and  do  it  before  those  black  eyes. 
Aunt  Frances's  eyes  were  soft,  light  blue. 

Oh,  how  she  wanted  Aunt  Frances  to  take 
care  of  her !  Nobody  cared  a  thing  about  her ! 
Nobody  understood  her  but  Aunt  Frances! 
She  wouldn't  go  back  at  all  to  Putney  Farm. 
She  would  just  walk  on  and  on  till  she  was  lost, 
and  the  night  would  come  and  she  would  lie 


86  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

down  and  freeze  to  death,  and  then  wouldn't 
Cousin  Ann  feel  .  .  .  Someone  called  to  her, 
''Isn't  this  Betsy!" 

She  looked  up  astonished.  A  young  girl  in 
a  gingham  dress  and  a  white  apron  like  those 
at  Putney  Farm  stood  in  front  of  a  tmy,  square 
building,  like  a  toy  house.  "Isn't  this  Betsy?" 
asked  the  young  girl  again.  "Your  Cousin 
Ann  said  you  were  coming  to  school  today 
and  I've  been  looking  out  for  you.  But  I  saw 
you  going  right  by,  and  I  ran  out  to  stop 
you." 

"Why,  where  is  the  school?"  asked  Betsy, 
staring  around  for  a  big  brick,  four-story  build- 
ing. 

The  young  girl  laughed  and  held  out  her 
hand.  "This  is  the  school,"  she  said  "and  I 
am  the  teacher,  and  you'd  better  come  right  in, 
for  it's  time  to  begin." 

She  led  Betsy  into  a  low-ceilinged  room  with 
geraniums  at  the  windows,  where  about  a 
dozen  children  of  different  ages  sat  behind 
their  desks.    At  the  first  sight  of  them  Betsy 


BETSY  GOES  TO  SCHOOL  87 

blushed  crimson  with  fright  and  shyness,  and 
hung  down  her  head;  but,  looking  out  the  cor- 
ners of  her  eyes,  she  saw  that  they,  too,  were 
all  very  red-faced  and  scared-looking  and  hung 
down  their  heads,  looking  at  her  shyly  out  of 
the  corners  of  their  eyes.  She  was  so  sur- 
prised by  this  that  she  forgot  all  about  herself 
and  looked  inquiringly  at  the  teacher. 

' '  They  don 't  see  many  strangers, ' '  the  teacher 
explained,  "and  they  feel  very  shy  and  scared 
when  a  new  scholar  comes,  especially  one  from 
the  city." 

"Is  this  my  grade? "  asked  Elizabeth,  think- 
ing it  the  very  smallest  grade  she  had  ever 
seen. 

"This  is  the  whole  school,"  said  the  teacher. 
"There  are  only  two  or  three  in  each  class. 
You'll  probably  have  three  in  yours.  Miss  Ann 
said  you  were  in  the  third  grade.  There,  that's 
your  seat." 

Elizabeth  sat  down  before  a  very  old  desk, 
much  battered  and  hacked  up  with  knife  marks. 
There  was  a  big  H.  P.  carved  just  over  the  ink- 


88  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

well,  and  many  other  initials  scattered  all  over 
the  top. 

The  teacher  stepped  back  to  her  desk  and 
took  up  a  violin  that  lay  there.  "Now,  chil- 
dren, we'll  begin  the  afternoon  session  by  sing- 
ing *  America,'  "  she  said.  She  played  the  air 
over  a  little  very  sweetly  and  stirringly,  and 
then  as  the  children  stood  up  she  came  down 
close  to  them,  standing  just  in  front  of  Betsy. 
She  drew  the  bow  across  the  strings  in  a  big 
chord,  and  said,  "Now,"  and  Betsy  burst  into 
song  with  the  others.  The  sun  came  in  the  win- 
dows brightly,  the  teacher,  too,  sang  as  she 
played,  and  all  the  children,  even  the  littlest 
ones,  opened  their  mouths  wide  and  sang 
lustily. 


CHAPTER  V 

WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY? 

After  the  singing  the  teacher  gave  Elizabeth 
Ann  a  pile  of  schoolbooks,  some  paper,  some 
pencils,  and  a  pen,  and  told  her  to  set  her  desk 
in  order.  There  were  more  initials  carved  in- 
side, another  big  H.  P.  with  a  little  A.  P. 
under  it.  What  a  lot  of  children  must  have 
sat  there,  thought  the  little  girl  as  she  ar- 
ranged her  books  and  papers.  As  she  shut 
down  the  lid  the  teacher  finished  giving  some 
instructions  to  three  or  four  little  ones  and 
said,  "Betsy  and  Ralph  and  Ellen,  bring  your 
reading  books  up  here." 

Betsy  sighed,  took  out  her  third-grade  reader, 
and  went  with  the  other  two  up  to  the  battered 
old  bench  near  the  teacher's  desk.  She  knew 
all  about  reading  lessons  and  she  hated  them, 
although  she  loved  to  read.  But  reading  les- 
sons  .    .    .    !    You  sat  with  your  book  open  at 


90  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

some  reading  that  you  could  do  with  your  eyes 
shut,  it  was  so  easy,  and  you  waited  and  waited 
and  waited  while  your  classmates  slowly  stum- 
bled along,  reading  aloud  a  sentence  or  two 
apiece,  until  your  turn  came  to  stand  up  and 
read  your  sentence  or  two,  which  by  that  time 
sounded  just  like  nonsense  because  you'd  read 
it  over  and  over  so  many  times  to  yourself  be- 
fore your  chance  came.  And  often  you  didn't 
even  have  a  chance  to  do  that,  because  the 
teacher  didn't  have  time  to  get  around  to  you 
at  all,  and  you  closed  your  book  and  put  it 
back  in  your  desk  without  having  opened  your 
mouth.  Beading  was  one  thing  Elizabeth  Ann 
had  learned  to  do  very  well  indeed,  but  she  had 
learned  it  all  by  herself  at  home  from  much 
reading  to  herself.  Aunt  Frances  had  kept 
her  well  supplied  with  children's  books  from 
the  nearest  public  library.  She  often  read 
three  a  week — very  different,  that,  from  a 
sentence  or  two  once  or  twice  a  week. 

When  she  sat  down  on  the  battered  old  bench 
she  almost  laughed  aloud,  it  seemed  so  funny 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  91 

to  be  in  a  class  of  only  three.  There  had  been 
forty  in  her  grade  in  the  big  brick  building. 
She  sat  in  the  middle,  the  little  girl  whom  the 
teacher  had  called  Ellen  on  one  side,  and  Ralph 
on  the  other.  Ellen  was  very  pretty,  with  fair 
hair  smoothly  braided  in  two  little  pig-tails, 
sweet,  blue  eyes,  and  a  clean  blue-and-white 
gingham  dress.  Ealph  had  very  black  eyes, 
dark  hair,  a  big  bruise  on  his  forehead,  a  cut 
on  his  chin,  and  a  tear  in  the  knee  of  his  short 
trousers.  He  was  much  bigger  than  Ellen,  and 
Elizabeth  Ann  thought  he  looked  rather  fierce. 
She  decided  that  she  would  be  afraid  of  him, 
and  would  not  like  him  at  all. 

' '  Page  thirty-two, ' '  said  the  teacher.  ' '  Ralph 
first." 

Ralph  stood  up  and  began  to  read.  It 
sounded  very  familiar  to  Elizabeth  Ann,  for  he 
did  not  read  at  all  well.  What  was  not  fa- 
miliar was  that  the  teacher  did  not  stop  him 
after  the  first  sentence.  He  read  on  and  on  till 
he  had  read  a  page,  the  teacher  only  helping 
him  with  the  hardest  words. 


92  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

"Now  Betsy,"  said  the  teacher. 

Elizabeth  Ann  stood  up,  read  the  first  sen- 
tence, and  paused,  like  a  caged  lion  pausing 
when  he  comes  to  the  end  of  his  cage. 

"Go  on,"  said  the  teacher. 

Elizabeth  Ann  read  the  next  sentence  and 
stopped  again,  automatically. 

"Go  on,"  said  the  teacher,  looking  at  her 
sharply. 

The  next  time  the  little  girl  paused  the 
teacher  laughed  out  good-naturedly.  "What 
is  the  matter  with  you,  Betsy?"  she  said.  "Go 
on  till  I  tell  you  to  stop." 

So  Elizabeth  Ann,  very  much  surprised  but 
very  much  interested,  read  on,  sentence  after 
sentence,  till  she  forgot  they  were  sentences 
and  just  thought  of  what  they  meant.  She  read 
a  whole  page  and  then  another  page,  and  that 
was  the  end  of  the  selection.  She  had  never 
read  aloud  so  much  in  her  life.  She  was  aware 
that  everybody  in  the  room  had  stopped  work- 
ing to  listen  to  her.  She  felt  very  proud  and 
less   afraid   than   she   had  ever   thought   she 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  93 

could  be  in  a  schoolroom.  When  she  finished, 
"You  read  very  well!"  said  the  teacher.  "Is 
this  very  easy  for  you?" 

"Oh,  yes!"  said  Elizabeth  Ann. 

"I  guess,  then,  that  you'd  better  not  stay  in 
this  class,"  said  the  teacher.  She  took  a  book 
out  of  her  desk.    "See  if  you  can  read  that." 

Elizabeth  Ann  began  in  her  usual  school- 
reading  style,  very  slow  and  monotonous,  but 
this  didn't  seem  like  a  "reader"  at  all.  It 
was  poetry,  full  of  hard  words  that  were  fun  to 
try  to  pronounce,  and  it  was  all  about  an  old 
woman  who  would  hang  out  an  American  flag, 
even  though  the  town  was  full  of  rebel  sol- 
diers. She  read  faster  and  faster,  getting 
more  and  more  excited,  till  she  broke  out  with 
"Halt!"  in  such  a  loud,  spirited  voice  that  the 
sound  of  it  startled  her  and  made  her  stop, 
fearing  that  she  would  be  laughed  at.  But 
nobody  laughed.  They  were  all  listening,  very 
eagerly,  even  the  little  ones,  with  their  eyes 
turned  toward  her. 

"You  might  as  well  go  on  and  let  us  see  how 


94  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

it  came  out,"  said  the  teacher,  and  Betsy  fin- 
ished triumphantly. 

"Well,"  said  the  teacher,  "there's  no  sense 
in  your  reading  along  in  the  third  reader. 
After  this  you'll  recite  out  of  the  seventh 
reader  with  Frank  and  Harry  and  Stashie." 

Elizabeth  Ann  could  not  believe  her  ears. 
To  be  " jumped"  four  grades  in  that  casual 
way!  It  wasn't  possible!  She  at  once  thought, 
however,  of  something  that  would  prevent 
it  entirely,  and  while  Ellen  was  reading  her 
page  in  a  slow,  careful  little  voice,  Elizabeth 
Ann  was  feeling  miserably  that  she  must  ex- 
plain to  the  teacher  why  she  couldn't  read  with 
the  seventh-grade  children.  Oh,  how  she 
wished  she  could!  When  they  stood  up  to  go 
back  to  their  seats  she  hesitated,  hung  her 
head,  and  looked  very  unhappy.  "Did  you 
want  to  say  something  to  me?"  asked  the 
teacher,  pausing  with  a  bit  of  chalk  in  her 
hand. 

The  little  girl  went  up  to  her  desk  and  said, 
what  she  knew  it  was  her  duty  to  confess:  "I 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  95 

can't  be  allowed  to  read  in  the  seventh  reader. 
I  don't  write  a  bit  well,  and  I  never  get  the 
mental  number- work  right.  I  couldn't  do  any- 
thing with  seventh-grade  arithmetic!" 

The  teacher  looked  a  little  blank  and  said:*'/ 
didn't  say  anything  about  your  number-work! 
I  don't  know  anything  about  it!  You  haven't 
recited  yet."  She  turned  away  and  began  to 
write  a  list  of  words  on  the  board.  "  Betsy, 
Ralph,  and  Ellen  study  their  spelling,"  she 
said.  "You  little  ones  come  up  for  your  read- 
ing." 

Two  little  boys  and  two  little  girls  came  for- 
ward as  Elizabeth  Ann  began  to  con  over  the 
words  on  the  board.  At  first  she  found  she 
was  listening  to  the  little,  chirping  voices,  as  the 
children  struggled  with  their  reading,  instead 
of  studying  "doubt,  travel,  cheese,"  and  the 
other  words  in  her  lesson.  But  she  put  her 
hands  over  her  ears,  and  her  mind  on  her  spell- 
ing. She  wanted  to  make  a  good  impression 
with  that  lesson.  After  a  while,  when  she  was 
sure  she  could  spell  them  all  correctly,  she  be- 


96  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

gan  to  listen  and  look  around  her.  She  always 
"got"  her  spelling  in  less  time  than  was  al- 
lowed the  class,  and  usually  sat  idle,  looking 
out  of  the  window  until  that  study  period  was 
over.  But  now  the  moment  she  stopped  star- 
ing at  the  board  and  moving  her  lips  as  she 
spelled  to  herself  the  teacher  said,  just  as 
though  she  had  been  watching  her  every  min- 
ute instead  of  conducting  a  class,  "Betsy,  have 
you  learned  your  spelling  ?" 

"Yes,  ma'am,  I  think  so,"  said  Elizabeth 
Ann,  wondering  very  much  why  she  was  asked. 

"That's  fine,"  said  the  teacher.  "I  wish 
you'd  take  little  Molly  over  in  that  corner  and 
help  her  with  her  reading.  She's  getting  on 
so  much  better  than  the  rest  of  the  class  that  I 
hate  to  have  her  lose  her  time.  Just  hear  her 
read  the  rest  of  her  little  story,  will  you,  and 
don't  help  her  unless  she's  really  stuck." 

Elizabeth  Ann  was  startled  by  this  request, 
which  was  unheard-of  in  her  experience.  She 
was  very  uncertain  of  herself  as  she  sat  down 
on  a  low  chair  in  the  corner  of  the  schoolroom 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  97 

away  from  the  desks,  with  the  little  child  lean- 
ing on  her  knee.  And  yet  she  was  not  exactly 
afraid,  either,  because  Molly  was  such  a  shy 
little  roly-poly  thing,  with  her  crop  of  yellow 
curls,  and  her  bright  blue  eyes  very  serious 
as  she  looked  hard  at  the  book  and  began: 
"Once  there  was  a  rat.  It  was  a  fat  rat." 
No,  it  was  impossible  to  be  frightened  of  such 
a  funny  little  girl,  who  peered  so  earnestly  into 
the  older  child's  face  to  make  sure  she  was  do- 
ing her  lesson  right. 

Elizabeth  Ann  had  never  had  anything  to 
do  with  children  younger  than  herself,  and  she 
felt  very  pleased  and  important  to  have  any- 
body look  up  to  her!  She  put  her  arm  around 
Molly's  square,  warm,  fat  little  body  and  gave 
her  a  squeeze.  Molly  snuggled  up  closer,  and 
the  two  children  put  their  heads  together  over 
the  printed  page,  Elizabeth  Ann  correcting 
Molly  very  gently  indeed  when  she  made  a 
mistake,  and  waiting  patiently  when  she  hesi- 
tated. She  had  so  fresh  in  her  mind  her  own 
suffering  from  quick,  nervous  corrections  that 


98  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

she  took  the  greatest  pleasure  in  speaking 
quietly  and  not  interrupting  the  little  girl 
more  than  was  necessary.  It  was  fun  to  teach, 
lots  of  fun!  She  was  surprised  when  the 
teacher  said,  "Well,  Betsy,  how  did  Molly  do?" 

"Oh,  is  the  time  up?"  said  Elizabeth  Ann. 
"Why,  she  does  beautifully,  I  think,  for  such 
a  little  thing." 

"Do  you  suppose,"  said  the  teacher  thought- 
fully, just  as  though  Betsy  were  a  grown-up 
person,  "do  you  suppose  she  could  go  into  the 
second  reader,  with  Eliza?  There's  no  use 
keeping  her  in  the  first  if  she's  ready  to  go 
on." 

Elizabeth  Ann's  head  whirled  with  this  sec- 
ond light-handed  juggling  with  the  sacred  dis- 
tinction between  the  grades.  In  the  big  brick 
schoolhouse  nobody  ever  went  into  another 
grade  except  at  the  beginning  of  a  new  year, 
after  you'd  passed  a  lot  of  examinations.  She 
had  not  known  that  anybody  could  do  anything 
else.  The  idea  that  everybody  took  a  year  to 
a  grade,  no  matter  what!  was  so  fixed  in  her 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  99 

mind  that  she  felt  as  though  the  teacher  had 
said:  "How  would  you  like  to  stop  being  nine 
years  old  and  be  twelve  instead?  And  don't 
you  think  Molly  would  better  be  eight  instead 
of  six?" 

However,  just  then  her  class  in  arithmetic 
was  called,  so  that  she  had  no  more  time  to  be 
puzzled.  She  came  forward  with  Ralph  and 
Ellen  again,  very  low  in  her  mind.  She  hated 
arithmetic  with  all  her  might,  and  she  really 
didn't  understand  a  thing  about  it!  By  long 
experience  she  had  learned  to  read  her  teach- 
ers' faces  very  accurately,  and  she  guessed  by 
their  expression  whether  the  answer  she  gave 
was  the  right  one.  And  that  was  the  only  way 
she  could  tell.  You  never  heard  of  any  other 
child  who  did  that,  did  you? 

They  had  mental  arithmetic,  of  course  (Eliza- 
beth Ann  thought  it  just  her  luck!),  and  of 
course  it  was  those  hateful  eights  and  sevens, 
and  of  course  right  away  poor  Betsy  got  the 
one  she  hated  most,  7x8.  She  never  knew  that 
one!    She  said  dispiritedly  that  it  was  54,  re- 


100  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

membering  vaguely  that  it  was  somewhere  in 
the  fifties.  Ealph  burst  out  scornfully,  "56!" 
and  the  teacher,  as  if  she  wanted  to  take  him 
down  for  showing  off,  pounced  on  him  with 
9x8.  He  answered,  without  drawing  breath, 
72.  Elizabeth  Ann  shuddered  at  his  accuracy. 
Ellen,  too,  rose  to  the  occasion  when  she  got 
6x7,  which  Elizabeth  Ann  could  sometimes  re- 
member and  sometimes  not.  And  then,  oh  hor- 
rors! It  was  her  turn  again!  Her  turn  had 
never  before  come  more  than  twice  during  a 
mental  arithmetic  lesson.  She  was  so  startled 
by  the  swiftness  with  which  the  question  went 
around  that  she  balked  on  6x6,  which  she 
knew  perfectly.  And  before  she  could  recover 
Ralph  had  answered  and  had  rattled  out  a 
108  in  answer  to  9  x  12 ;  and  then  Ellen  slapped 
down  an  84  on  top  of  7x12.  Good  gracious! 
"Who  could  have  guessed,  from  the  way  they 
read,  they  could  do  their  tables  like  this !  She 
herself  missed  on  7  x  7  and  was  ready  to  cry. 
After  this  the  teacher  didn't  call  on  her  at  all, 
but  showered  questions  down  on  the  other  two, 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  101 

who  sent  the  answers  back  with  sickening 
speed. 

After  the  lesson  the  teacher  said,  smiling, 
"Well,  Betsy,  you  were  right  about  your  arith- 
metic. I  guess  you'd  better  recite  with  Eliza 
for  a  while.  She's  doing  second-grade  work. 
I  shouldn't  be  surprised  if,  after  a  good  review 
with  her,  you'd  be  able  to  go  on  with  the  third- 
grade  work." 

Elizabeth  Ann  fell  back  on  the  bench  with 
her  mouth  open.  She  felt  really  dizzy.  What 
crazy  things  the  teacher  said!  She  felt  as 
though  she  was  being  pulled  limb  from  limb. 

"What's  the  matter?"  asked  the  teacher,  see- 
ing her  bewildered  fact. 

"Why— why,"  said  Elizabeth  Ann,  "I  don't 
know  what  I  am  at  all.  If  I'm  second-grade 
arithmetic  and  seventh-grade  reading  and 
third-grade  spelling,  what  grade  am  I?" 

The  teacher  laughed  at  the  turn  of  her 
phrase.  "You  aren't  any  grade  at  all,  no  mat- 
ter where  you  are  in  school.  You're  just  your- 
self,   aren't    you?     What   difference    does    it 


102  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

make  what  grade  you're  in?  And  what's  the 
use  of  your  reading  little  baby  things  too  easy 
for  you  just  because  you  don't  know  your 
multiplication  table?" 

"Well,  for  goodness'  sakes!"  ejaculated 
Elizabeth  Ann,  feeling  very  much  as  though 
somebody  had  stood  her  suddenly  on  her  head. 

"Why,  what's  the  matter?"  asked  the  teacher 
again. 

This  time  Elizabeth  Ann  didn't  answer,  be- 
cause she  herself  didn't  know  what  the  matter 
was.  But  I  do,  and  I'll  tell  you.  The  matter 
was  that  never  before  had  she  known  what  she 
was  doing  in  school.  She  had  always  thought 
she  was  there  to  pass  from  one  grade  to 
another,  and  she  was  ever  so  startled  to  get  a 
little  glimpse  of  the  fact  that  she  was  there  to 
learn  how  to  read  and  write  and  cipher  and 
generally  use  her  mind,  so  she  could  take  care 
of  herself  when  she  came  to  be  grown  up.  Of 
course,  she  didn't  really  know  that  till  she  did 
come  to  be  grown  up,  but  she  had  her  first  dim 
notion  of  it  in  that  moment,  and  it  made  her 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  103 

feel  the  way  you  do  when  you're  learning  to 
skate  and  somebody  pulls  away  the  chair 
you've  been  leaning  on  and  says,  "Now,  go  it 
alone ! ' ' 

The  teacher  waited  a  minute,  and  then,  wTien 
Elizabeth  Ann  didn't  say  anything  more,  she 
rang  a  little  bell.  "Kecess  time,"  she  said, 
and  as  the  children  marched  out  and  began  put- 
ting on  their  wraps  she  followed  them  into  the 
cloak-room,  pulled  on  a  warm,  red  cap  and  a 
red  sweater,  and  ran  outdoors  herself.  "Who's 
on  my  side ! ' '  she  called,  and  the  children  came 
darting  out  after  her.  Elizabeth  Ann  had 
dreaded  the  first  recess  time  with  the  strange 
children,  but  she  had  no  time  to  feel  shy,  for 
in  a  twinkling  she  was  on  one  end  of  a  long 
rope  with  a  lot  of  her  schoolmates,  pulling  with 
all  her  might  against  the  teacher  and  two  of 
the  big  boys.  Nobody  had  looked  at  her  curi- 
ously, nobody  had  said  anything  to  her  beyond 
a  loud,  "Come  on,  Betsy!"  from  Ealph,  who 
was  at  the  head  on  their  side. 

They  pulled  and  they  pulled,  digging  their 


104  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

feet  into  the  ground  and  bracing  themselves 
against  the  rocks  which  stuck  up  out  of  the  play- 
ground. Sometimes  the  teacher's  side  yanked 
them  along  by  quick  jerks,  and  then  they'd 
all  set  their  feet  hard  when  Ralph  shouted  out, 
"Now,  all  together!"  and  they'd  slowly  drag 
the  other  side  back.  And  all  the  time  every- 
body was  shouting  and  yelling  together  with 
the  excitement.  Betsy  was  screaming  too,  and 
when  a  wagon  passing  by  stopped  and  a  big, 
broad-shouldered  farmer  jumped  down  laugh- 
ing, put  the  end  of  the  rope  over  his  shoulder, 
and  just  walked  off  with  the  wThole  lot  of  them 
till  he  had  pulled  them  clear  off  their  feet, 
Elizabeth  Ann  found  herself  rolling  over  and 
over  with  a  breathless,  squirming  mass  of  chil- 
dren, her  shrill  laughter  rising  even  above  the 
shouts  of  merriment  of  the  others.  She  laughed 
so  she  could  hardly  get  up  on  her  feet  again, 
it  was  such  an  unexpected  ending  to  the  con- 
test. 

The  big  farmer  was  laughing  too.     "You 
ain't  so  smart  as  you  think  you  are,  are  you!" 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  105 

he  jeered  at  them  good-naturedly.  Then  he 
started,  yelling  ''WHOA  there!"  to  his  horses, 
which  had  begun  to  walk  on.  He  had  to  run 
after  them  with  all  his  might,  and  just  climbed 
into  the  back  of  the  wagon  and  grabbed  the 
reins  the  very  moment  they  broke  into  a  trot. 
The  children  laughed,  and  Ealph  shouted  after 
him,  "Hi,  there,  Uncle  Nate!  Who's  not  so 
smart  as  he  thinks  he  is,  now!"  He  turned  to 
the  little  girls  near  him.  "They  'most  got 
away  from  him  that  time!"  he  said.  "He's 
awful  foolish  about  leaving  them  standing 
while  he's  funning  or  something.  He  thinks 
he's  awful  funny,  anyhow.  Some  day  they'll 
run  away  on  him  and  then  where '11  he  be?" 
Elizabeth  Ann  was  thinking  to  herself  that 
this  was  one  of  the  queerest  things  that  had 
happened  to  her  even  in  this  queer  place. 
Never,  why  never  once,  had  any  grown-up,  pass- 
ing the  playground  of  the  big  brick  building, 
dreamed  of  such  a  thing  as  stopping  for  a  min- 
ute to  play.  They  never  even  looked  at  the 
children,  any  more  than  if  they  were  in  another 


106  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

world.  In  fact  she  had  felt  the  school  was  in 
another  world. 

" Ralph,  it's  your  turn  to  get  the  water," 
said  the  teacher,  handing  him  a  pail.  ''Want 
to  go  along?"  said  Ralph  gruffly  to  Ellen  and 
Betsy.  He  led  the  way  and  the  little  girls 
walked  after  him.  Now  that  she  was  out  of  a 
crowd  Elizabeth  Ann  felt  all  her  shyness  come 
down  on  her  like  a  black  cloud,  drying  up  her 
mouth  and  turning  her  hands  and  feet  cold  as 
ice.  Into  one  of  these  cold  hands  she  felt 
small,  warm  fingers  slide.  She  looked  down 
and  there  was  little  Molly  trotting  by  her  side, 
turning  her  blue  eyes  up  trustfully.  "Teacher 
says  I  can  go  with  you  if  you'll  take  care 
of  me,"  she  said.  "She  never  lets  us  first- 
graders  go  without  somebody  bigger  to  help 
us  over  the  log." 

As  she  spoke  they  came  to  a  small,  clear, 
swift  brook,  crossed  by  a  big  white-birch  log. 
Elizabeth  Ann  was  horribly  afraid  to  set  foot 
on  it,  but  with  little  Molly's  hand  holding 
tightly  to  hers  she  was  ashamed  to  say  she  was 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  107 

afraid.  Ralph  skipped  across,  swinging  the 
pail  to  show  how  easy  it  was  for  him.  Ellen 
followed  more  slowly,  and  then — oh,  don't  you 
wish  Aunt  Frances  could  have  been  there! — 
Betsy  shut  her  teeth  together  hard,  put  Molly 
ahead  of  her,  took  her  hand,  and  started  across. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  Molly  went  along  as  sure- 
footed as  a  little  goat,  having  done  it  a  hun- 
dred times,  and  it  was  she  who  steadied  Eliza- 
beth Ann.  But  nobody  knew  this,  Molly  least 
of  all. 

Ralph  took  a  drink  out  of  a  tin  cup  standing 
on  a  stump  near  by,  dipped  the  pail  into  a 
deep,  clear  pool,  and  started  back  to  the  school. 
Ellen  took  a  drink  and  offered  the  cup  to  Betsy, 
very  shyly,  without  looking  up.  After  they 
had  all  three  had  a  drink  they  stood  there  for 
a  moment,  much  embarrassed.  Then  Ellen  said, 
in  a  very  small  voice,  "Do  you  like  dolls  with 
yellow  hair  the  best?" 

Now  it  happened  that  Elizabeth  Ann  had 
very  positive  convictions  on  this  point  which 
she  had  never  spoken  of,  because  Aunt  Fran- 


108  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ces  didn't  really  care  about  dolls.  She  only 
pretended  to,  to  be  company  for  her  little 
niece. 

"No,  I  don't!"  answered  the  little  girl  em- 
phatically. "I  get  just  sick  and  tired  of  al- 
ways seeing  them  with  that  old,  bright-yellow 
hair !  I  like  them  to  have  brown  hair,  just  the 
way  most  little  girls  really  do!" 

Ellen  lifted  her  eyes  and  smiled  radiantly. 
"Oh,  so  do  I!"  she  said.  "And  that  lovely  old 
doll  your  folks  have  has  got  brown  hair.  Will 
you  let  me  play  with  her  some  time?" 

"My  folks?"  said  Elizabeth  Ann  blankly. 

"Why  yes,  your  Aunt  Abigail  and  your 
Uncle  Henry." 

"Have  they  got  a  doll?"  said  Betsy,  think- 
ing this  was  the  very  climax  of  Putney  queer- 
ness. 

' '  Oh  my,  yes ! ' '  said  Molly,  eagerly.  ' '  She 's 
the  one  Mrs.  Putney  had  when  she  was  a  little 
girl.  And  she 's  got  the  loveliest  clothes !  She 's 
in  the  hair- trunk  under  the  eaves  in  the  attic. 
They  let  me  take  her  down  once  when  I  was 


Betsy  shut  her  teeth  together  hard,  and  started  across. 


WHAT  GRADE  IS  BETSY?  109 

there  with  Mother.  And  Mother  said  she 
guessed,  now  a  little  girl  had  come  there  to 
live,  they'd  let  her  have  her  down  all  the  time. 
I'll  bring  mine  over  next  Saturday,  if  you  want 
me  to.  Mine's  got  yellow  hair,  but  she's  real 
pretty  anyhow.  If  Father's  going  to  mill  that 
day,  he  can  leave  me  there  for  the  morning. ' ' 

Elizabeth  Ann  had  not  understood  more  than 
one  word  in  five  of  this,  but  just  then  the 
school-bell  rang  and  they  went  back,  little 
Molly  helping  Elizabeth  Ann  over  the  log  and 
thinking  she  was  being  helped,  as  before. 

They  ran  along  to  the  little  building,  and 
there  I'm  going  to  leave  them,  because  I  think 
I've  told  enough  about  their  school  for  one 
while.  It  was  only  a  poor,  rough,  little  district 
school  anyway,  that  no  Superintendent  of 
Schools  would  have  looked  at  for  a  minute,  ex- 
cept to  sniff. 


CHAPTER  VI 

IF  YOU  DON'T  LIKE  CONVERSATION  IN  A 
BOOK  SKIP  THIS  CHAPTER! 

Betsy  opened  the  door  and  was  greeted  by 
her  kitten,  who  ran  to  her,  purring  and  arching 
her  back  to  be  stroked. 

"Well,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  looking  up  from 
the  pan  of  apples  in  her  lap,  "I  suppose  you're 
starved,  aren't  you?  Get  yourself  a  piece  of 
bread  and  butter,  why  don't  you?  and  have  one 
of  these  apples." 

As  the  little  girl  sat  down  by  her,  munch- 
ing fast  on  this  provender,  she  asked:  "What 
desk  did  you  get?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  thought  for  a  moment,  cud- 
dling Eleanor  up  to  her  face.  "I  think  it  is  the 
third  from  the  front  in  the  second  row."  She 
wondered  why  Aunt  Abigail  cared.  "Oh,  I 
guess  that's  your  Uncle  Henry's  desk.  It's 
no 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  111 

the  one  his  father  had,  too.  Are  there  a  cou- 
ple of  H.  P.'s  carved  on  it?" 

Betsy  nodded. 

''His  father  carved  the  H.  P.  on  the  lid,  so 
Henry  had  to  put  his  inside.  I  remember  the 
winter  he  put  it  there.  It  was  the  first  season 
Mother  let  me  wear  real  hoop  skirts.  I  sat  in 
the  first  seat  on  the  third  row." 

Betsy  ate  her  apple  more  and  more  slowly, 
trying  to  take  in  what  Aunt  Abigail  had  said. 
Uncle  Henry  and  his  father — why  Moses  or 
Alexander  the  Great  didn't  seem  any  further 
back  in  the  mists  of  time  to  Elizabeth  Ann 
than  did  Uncle  Henry's  father!  And  to 
think  he  had  been  a  little  boy,  right  there  at 
that  desk !  She  stopped  chewing  altogether  for 
a  moment  and  stared  into  space.  Although  she 
was  only  nine  years  old,  she  was  feeling  a  lit- 
tle of  the  same  rapt  wonder,  the  same  aston- 
ished sense  of  the  reality  of  the  people  who 
have  gone  before,  which  make  a  first  visit  to 
the  Eoman  Forum  such  a  thrilling  event  for 
grown-ups.    That  very  desk! 


112  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

After  a  moment  she  came  to  herself,  and 
finding  some  apple  still  in  her  mouth,  went  on 
chewing  meditatively.  "Aunt  Abigail,"  she 
said,  "how  long  ago  was  that?" 

"  Let's  see,"  said  the  old  woman,  peeling 
apples  with  wonderful  rapidity.  "I  was  born 
in  18-4-4.  And  I  was  six  when  I  first  went  to 
school.     That's  sixty-six  years  ago." 

Elizabeth  Ann,  like  all  little  girls  of  nine,  had 
very  little  notion  how  long  sixty-six  years  might 
be.  ' '  Was  George  "Washington  alive  then  1 ' '  she 
asked. 

The  wrinkles  around  Aunt  Abigail's  eyes 
deepened  mirthfully,  but  she  did  not  laugh  as 
she  answered,  "No,  that  was  long  after  he 
died,  but  the  schoolhouse  was  there  when  he 
was  alive." 

"It  was!"  said  Betsy,  staring,  with  her 
teeth  set  deep  in  an  apple. 

"Yes,  indeed.  It  was  the  first  house  in  the 
valley  built  of  sawed  lumber.  You  know,  when 
our  folks  came  up  here,  they  had  to  build  all 
their  houses  of  logs  to  begin  with." 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  113 

"  They  did!"  cried  Betsy,  with  her  mouth 
full  of  apple. 

"Why  yes,  child,  what  else  did  you  suppose 
they  had  to  make  houses  out  of?  They  had  to 
have  something  to  live  in,  right  off.  The  saw- 
mills came  later." 

"I  didn't  know  anything  about  it,"  said 
Betsy.    "Tell  me  about  it." 

"Why  you  knew,  didn't  you — your  Aunt 
Harriet  must  have  told  you — about  how  our 
folks  came  up  here  from  Connecticut  in  1763, 
on  horseback!  Connecticut  was  an  old  settled 
place  then,  compared  to  Vermont.  There 
wasn't 'anything  here  but  trees  and  bears  and 
wood-pigeons.  I've  heard  'em  say  that  the 
wood-pigeons  were  so  thick  you  could  go  out 
after  dark  and  club  'em  out  of  the  trees,  just 
like  hens  roosting  in  a  hen-house.  There  al- 
ways was  cold  pigeon-pie  in  the  pantry,  just 
the  way  we  have  doughnuts.  And  they  used 
bear-grease  to  grease  their  boots  and  their 
hair,  bears  were  so  plenty.  It  sounds  like 
good  eating,  don't  it!    But  of  course  that  was 


114  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

just  at  first.  It  got  quite  settled  up  before 
long,  and  by  the  time  of  the  Revolution,  bears 
were  getting  pretty  scarce,  and  soon  the  wood- 
pigeons  were  all  gone." 

"And  the  schoolhouse  —  that  schoolhouse 
where  I  went  today — was  that  built  then?" 
Elizabeth  Ann  found  it  hard  to  believe. 

"Yes,  it  used  to  have  a  great  big  chimney 
and  fireplace  in  it.  It  was  built  long  before 
stoves  were  invented,  you  know." 

"Why,  I  thought  stoves  were  always  in- 
vented!" cried  Elizabeth  Ann.  This  was  the 
most  startling  and  interesting  conversation  she 
had  ever  taken  part  in. 

Aunt  Abigail  laughed.  "Mercy,  no,  child! 
Why,  I  can  remember  when  only  folks  that 
were  pretty  well  off  had  stoves^  and  real  poor 
people  still  cooked  over  a  hearth  fire.  I  al- 
ways thought  it  a  pity  they  tore  down  the  big 
chimney  and  fireplace  out  of  the  schoolhouse 
and  put  in  that  big,  ugly  stove.  But  folks  are 
so  daft  over  new-fangled  things.  Well,  any- 
how, they  couldn't  take  away  the  sun-dial  on 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  115 

the  window-sill.  You  want  to  be  sure  to  look 
at  that.  It's  on  the  sill  of  the  middle  window 
on  the  right  hand  as  you  face  the  teacher's 
desk." 

' '  Sun-dial, ' '  repeated  Betsy.  ' '  What 's  that  \ ' ' 

"Why  to  tell  the  time  by,  when " 

"Why  didn't  they  have  a  clock?"  asked  the 
child. 

Aunt  Abigail  laughed.  "Good  gracious, 
there  was  only  one  clock  in  the  valley  for  years 
and  years,  and  that  belonged  to  the  Wardons, 
the  rich  people  in  the  village.  Everybody  had 
sun-dials  cut  in  their  window-sills.  There's 
one  on  the  window-sill  of  our  pantry  this  min- 
ute. Come  on,  I'll  show  it  to  you."  She  got 
up  heavily  with  her  pan  of  apples,  and  trotted 
briskly,  shaking  the  floor  as  she  went,  over  to 
the  stove.  "But  first  just  watch  me  put  these 
on  to  cook  so  you'll  know  how."  She  set  the 
pan  on  the  stove,  poured  some  water  from  the 
tea-kettle  over  the  apples,  and  put  on  a  cover. 
"Now  come  on  into  the  pantry." 
They  entered  a  sweet-smelling,  spicy  little 


116  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

room,  all  white  paint,  and  shelves  which  were 
loaded  with  dishes  and  boxes  and  bags  and 
pans  of  milk  and  jars  of  preserves. 

"There!"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  opening  the 
window.  "That's  not  so  good  as  the  one  at 
school.    This  only  tells  when  noon  is." 

Elizabeth  Ann  stared  stupidly  at  the  deep 
scratch  on  the  window-sill. 

' '  Don 't  you  see  ? "  said  Aunt  Abigail.  ' '  When 
the  shadow  got  to  that  mark  it  was  noon.  And 
the  rest  of  the  time  you  guessed  by  how  far 
it  was  from  the  mark.  Let's  see  if  I  can  come 
anywhere  near  it  now.  She  looked  at  it  hard 
and  said:  "I  guess  it's  half -past  four."  She 
glanced  back  into  the  kitchen  at  the  clock  and 
said:  "Oh  pshaw!  It's  ten  minutes  past  five! 
Now  my  grandmother  could  have  told  that 
within  five  minutes,  just  by  the  place  of  the 
shadow.  I  declare !  Sometimes  it  seems  to  me 
that  every  time  a  new  piece  of  machinery 
comes  into  the  door  some  of  our  wits  fly  out 
at  the  window!  Now  I  couldn't  any  more  live 
without  matches  than  I  could  fly!     And  yet 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  117 

they  all  used  to  get  along  all  right  before  they 
had  matches.  Makes  me  feel  foolish  to  think 
I'm  not  smart  enough  to  get  along,  if  I  wanted 
to,  without  those  little  snips  of  pine  and  brim- 
stone. Here,  Betsy,  take  a  cooky.  It's  against 
my  principles  to  let  a  child  leave  the  pantry 
without  having  a  cooky.  My!  it  does  seem 
like  living  again  to  have  a  young  one  around 
to  stuff!" 

Betsy  took  the  cooky,  but  went  on  with  the 
conversation  by  exclaiming,  "How  could  any- 
body get  along  without  matches?  You  have 
to  have  matches." 

Aunt  Abigail  didn't  answer  at  first.  They 
were  back  in  the  kitchen  now.  She  was  look- 
ing at  the  clock  again.  "See  here,"  she  said; 
"it's  time  I  began  getting  supper  ready.  We 
divide  up  on  the  work.  Ann  gets  the  dinner 
and  I  get  the  supper.  And  everybody  gets  his 
own  breakfast.  Which  would  you  rather  do, 
help  Ann  with  the  dinner,  or  me  with  the  sup- 
per?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  had  not  had  the  slightest  idea 


118  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

of  helping  anybody  with  any  meal,  but,  con- 
fronted unexpectedly  with  the  alternative  of- 
fered, she  made  up  her  mind  so  quickly  that  she 
didn't  want  to  help  Cousin  Ann,  and  declared 
so  loudly,  ''Oh,  help  you  with  the  supper!" 
that  her  promptness  made  her  sound  quite 
hearty  and  willing.  "Well,  that's  fine,"  said 
Aunt  Abigail.  "We'll  set  the  table  now.  But 
first  you  would  better  look  at  that  apple  sauce. 
I  hear  it  walloping  away  as  though  it  was  boil- 
ing too  fast.  Maybe  you'd  better  push  it  back 
where  it  won't  cook  so  fast.  There  are  the 
holders,  on  that  hook." 

Elizabeth  Ann  approached  the  stove  with 
the  holder  in  her  hand  and  horror  in  her  heart. 
Nobody  had  ever  dreamed  of  asking  her  to 
handle  hot  things.  She  looked  around  dismally 
at  Aunt  Abigail,  but  the  old  woman  was  stand- 
ing with  her  back  turned,  doing  something  at 
the  kitchen  table.  Very  gingerly  the  little  girl 
took  hold  of  the  handle  of  the  saucepan,  and 
very  gingerly  she  shoved  it  to  the  back  of  the 
stove.    And  then  she  stood  still  a  moment  to 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  119 

admire  herself.  She  could  do  that  as  well  as 
anybody ! 

"Why,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  as  if  remember- 
ing that  Betsy  had  asked  her  a  question.  "Any 
man  could  strike  a  spark  from  his  flint  and 
steel  that  he  had  for  his  gun.  And  he'd  keep 
striking  it  till  it  happened  to  fly  out  in  the 
right  direction,  and  you'd  catch  it  in  some 
fluff  where  it  would  start  a  smoulder,  and 
you'd  blow  on  it  till  you  got  a  little  flame,  and 
drop  tiny  bits  of  shaved-up  dry  pine  in  it,  and 
so,  little  by  little,  you'd  build  your  fire  up." 

"But  it  must  have  taken  forever  to  do 
that!" 

"Oh,  you  didn't  have  to  do  that  more  than 
once  in  ever  so  long,"  said  Aunt  Abigail, 
briskly.  She  interrupted  her  story  to  say: 
"Now  you  put  the  silver  around,  while  I  cream 
the  potatoes.  It's  in  that  drawer — a  knife,  a 
fork,  and  two  spoons  for  each  place — and  the 
plates  and  cups  are  up  there  behind  the  glass 
doors.  We're  going  to  have  hot  cocoa  again  to- 
night. ' '   And  as  the  little  girl,  hypnotized  by  the 


120  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

other's  casual,  offhand  way  of  issuing  instruc- 
tions, began  to  fumble  with  the  knives  and 
forks  she  went  on:  "Why,  you'd  start  your  fire 
that  way,  and  then  you'd  never  let  it  go  out. 
Everybody  that  amounted  to  anything  knew 
how  to  bank  the  hearth  fire  with  ashes  at  night 
so  it  would  be  sure  to  last.  And  the  first 
thing  in  the  morning,  you  got  down  on  your 
knees  and  poked  the  ashes  away  very  carefully 
till  you  got  to  the  hot  coals.  Then  you'd  blow 
with  the  bellows  and  drop  in  pieces  of  dry  pine 
— don't  forget  the  water-glasses — and  you'd 
blow  gently  till  they  flared  up  and  the  shavings 
caught,  and  there  your  fire  would  be  kindled 
again.    The  napkins  are  in  the  second  drawer." 

Betsy  went  on  setting  the  table,  deep  in 
thought,  reconstructing  the  old  life.  As  she 
put  the  napkins  around  she  said,  "But  some- 
times it  must  have  gone  out  .    .    ." 

"Yes,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  "sometimes  it 
went  out,  and  then  one  of  the  children  was 
sent  over  to  the  nearest  neighbor  to  borrow 
some    fire.      He'd    take    a    covered    iron   pan 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  121 

fastened  on  to  a  long  hickory  stick,  and  go 
through  the  woods — everything  was  woods 
then — to  the  next  house  and  wait  till  they  had 
their  fire  going  and  could  spare  him  a  pan  full 
of  coals;  and  then — don't  forget  the  salt  and 
pepper — he  would  leg  it  home  as  fast  as  he 
could  streak  it,  to  get  there  before  the  coals 
went  out.  Say,  Betsy,  I  think  that  apple 
sauce  is  ready  to  be  sweetened.  You  do  it,  will 
you?  I've  got  my  hands  in  the  biscuit  dough. 
The  sugar's  in  the  left-hand  drawer  in  the 
kitchen  cabinet." 

"Oh,  my!"  cried  Betsy,  dismayed.  "I  don't 
know  how  to  cook!" 

Aunt  Abigail  laughed  and  put  back  a  strand 
of  curly  white  hair  with  the  back  of  her  floury 
hand.  "You  know  how  to  stir  sugar  into  your 
cup  of  cocoa,  don't  you!" 

"But  how  much  shall  I  put  in?"  asked  Eliza- 
beth Ann,  clamoring  for  exact  instruction  so 
she  wouldn't  need  to  do  any  thinking  for  her- 
self. 

"Oh,  till  it  tastes  right,"  said  Aunt  Abigail, 


122  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

carelessly.  "Fix  it  to  suit  yourself,  and  I 
guess  the  rest  of  us  will  like  it.  Take  that  big 
spoon  to  stir  it  with." 

Elizabeth  Ann  took  off  the  lid  and  began 
stirring  in  sugar,  a  teaspoonful  at  a  time,  but 
she  soon  saw  that  that  made  no  impression. 
She  poured  in  a  cupful,  stirred  it  vigorously, 
and  tasted  it.  Better,  but  not  quite  enough. 
She  put  in  a  tablespoonful  more  and  tasted 
it,  staring  off  into  space  under  bended  brows 
as  she  concentrated  her  attention  on  the  taste. 
It  was  quite  a  responsibility  to  prepare  the 
apple  sauce  for  a  family.  It  was  ever  so  good, 
too.  But  maybe  a  little  more  sugar.  She  put 
in  a  teaspoonful  and  decided  it  was  just  exactly 
right ! 

1 '  Done ! ' '  asked  Aunt  Abigail.  ' '  Take  it  off, 
then,  and  pour  it  out  in  that  big  yellow  bowl, 
and  put  it  on  the  table  in  front  of  your 
place.  You've  made  it;  you  ought  to  serve 
it." 

"It  isn't  done,  is  it?"  asked  Betsy.  "That 
isn't  all  you  do  to  make  apple  sauce!" 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  123 

"What  else  could  you  do?"  asked  Aunt  Abi- 
gail. 

"Well  .  .  . !"  said  Elizabeth  Ann,  very 
much  surprised.  "I  didn't  know  it  was  so 
easy  to  cook!" 

"Easiest  thing  in  the  world,"  said  Aunt 
Abigail  gravely,  with  the  merry  wrinkles 
around  her  merry  old  eyes  all  creased  up  with 
silent  fun. 

When  Uncle  Henry  came  in  from  the  barn, 
with  old  Shep  at  his  heels,  and  Cousin  Ann 
came  down  from  upstairs,  where  her  sewing- 
machine  had  been  humming  like  a  big  bee,  they 
were  both  duly  impressed  when  told  that  Betsy 
had  set  the  table  and  made  the  apple  sauce. 
They  pronounced  it  very  good  apple  sauce  in- 
deed, and  each  sent  his  saucer  back  to  the  lit- 
tle girl  for  a  second  helping.  She  herself  ate 
three  saucerfuls.  Her  own  private  opinion 
was  that  it  was  the  very  best  apple  sauce  ever 
made. 


124  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

After  supper  was  over  and  the  dishes  washed 
and  wiped,  Betsy  helping  with  the  putting- 
away,  the  four  gathered  around  the  big  lamp 
on  the  table  with  the  red  cover.  Cousin  Ann 
was  making  some  buttonholes  in  the  shirt- 
waist she  had  constructed  that  afternoon,  Aunt 
Abigail  was  darning  socks,  and  Uncle  Henry 
was  mending  a  piece  of  harness.  Shep  lay  on 
the  couch  and  snored  until  he  got  so  noisy 
they  couldn't  stand  it,  and  Cousin  Ann  poked 
him  in  the  ribs  and  he  woke  up  snorting  and 
gurgling  and  looking  around  very  sheepishly. 
Every  time  this  happened  it  made  Betsy  laugh. 
She  held  Eleanor,  who  didn't  snore  at  all,  but 
made  the  prettiest  little  tea-kettle-singing 
purr  deep  in  her  throat,  and  opened  and 
sheathed  her  needle-like  claws  in  Betsy's 
dress. 

"Well,  how'd  you  get  on  at  school V9  asked 
Uncle  Henry. 

"I've  got  your  desk,"  said  Elizabeth  Ann, 
looking  at  him  curiously,  at  his  gray  hair  and 
wrinkled,  weather-beaten  face,  and  trying  to 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  125 

think  what  he  must  have  looked  like  when  he 
was  a  little  boy  like  Ralph. 

"So?"  said  Uncle  Henry.  "Well,  let  me 
tell  you  that's  a  mighty  good  desk!  Did  you 
notice  the  deep  groove  in  the  top  of  it?" 

Betsy  nodded.  She  had  wondered  what  that 
was  used  for. 

"Well,  that  was  the  lead-pencil  desk  in  the 
old  days.  When  they  couldn't  run  down  to  the 
store  to  buy  things,  because  there  wasn't  any 
store  to  run  to,  how  do  you  suppose  they  got 
their  lead-pencils?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  shook  her  head,  incapable 
even  of  a  guess.  She  had  never  thought  before 
but  that  lead-pencils  grew  in  glass  show-cases 
in  stores. 

"Well,  sir,"  said  Uncle  Henry,  "I'll  tell 
you.  They  took  a  piece  off  the  lump  of  lead 
they  made  their  bullets  of,  melted  it  over  the 
fire  in  the  hearth  down  at  the  schoolhouse  till 
it  would  run  like  water,  and  poured  it  in  that 
groove.  When  it  cooled  off,  there  was  a  long 
streak  of  solid  lead,  about  as  big  as  one  of  our 


126  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

lead-pencils  nowadays.  They'd  break  that  up 
in  shorter  lengths,  and  there  you'd  have  your 
lead-pencils,  made  while  you  wait.  Oh,  I  tell 
you  in  the  old  days  folks  knew  how  to  take 
care  of  themselves  more  than  now." 

"Why,  weren't  there  any  stores?"  asked 
Elizabeth  Ann.  She  could  not  imagine  living 
without  buying  things  at  stores. 

"  Where  'd  they  get  the  things  to  put  in  a 
store  in  those  days?"  asked  Uncle  Henry, 
argumentatively.  "Every  single  thing  had  to 
be  lugged  clear  from  Albany  or  from  Con- 
necticut on  horseback." 

"Why  didn't  they  use  wagons?"  asked  Eliza- 
beth Ann. 

"You  can't  run  a  wagon  unless  you've  got 
a  road  to  run  it  on,  can  you?"  asked  Uncle 
Henry.  ' '  It  was  a  long,  long  time  before  they 
had  any  roads.  It's  an  awful  chore  to  make 
roads  in  a  new  country  all  woods  and  hills  and 
swamps  and  rocks.  You  were  lucky  if  there 
was  a  good  path  from  your  house  to  the  next 
settlement. ' ' 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  127 

"Now,  Henry,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  "do  stop 
going  on  about  old  times  long  enough  to  let 
Betsy  answer  the  question  you  asked  her.  You 
haven't  given  her  a  chance  to  say  how  she  got 
on  at  8011001." 

"Well,  I'm  awfully  mixed  up!"  said  Betsy, 
complainingly.  ' '  I  don 't  know  what  I  am !  I  'm 
second-grade  arithmetic  and  third-grade  spell- 
ing and  seventh-grade  reading  and  I  don't 
know  what  in  writing  or  composition.  We 
didn't  have  those." 

Nobody  seemed  to  think  this  very  remark- 
able, or  even  very  interesting.  Uncle  Henry, 
indeed,  noted  it  only  to  say,  "Seventh-grade 
reading!"  He  turned  to  Aunt  Abigail.  "Oh, 
Mother,  don't  you  suppose  she  could  read 
aloud  to  us  evenings?" 

Aunt  Abigail  and  Cousin  Ann  both  laid 
down  their  sewing  to  laugh !  ' '  Yes,  yes,  Father, 
and  play  checkers  with  you  too,  like  as  not!" 
They  explained  to  Betsy:  "Your  Uncle  Henry 
is  just  daft  on  being  read  aloud  to  when  he's 
got  something  to  do  in  the  evening,  and  when 


128  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

he  hasn't  he's  as  fidgety  as  a  broody  hen  if  he 
can't  play  checkers.  Ann  hates  checkers  and 
I  haven't  got  the  time,  often." 

"Oh,  I  love  to  play  checkers!"  said  Betsy. 

"Well,  now  ..."  said  Uncle  Henry,  rising 
instantly  and  dropping  his  half-mended  har- 
ness on  the  table.    "Let's  have  a  game." 

"Oh,  Father!"  said  Cousin  Ann,  in  the  tone 
she  used  for  Shep.  "How  about  that  piece  of 
breeching!  You  know  that's  not  safe.  Why 
don't  you  finish  that  up  first?" 

Uncle  Henry  sat  down  again,  looking  as 
Shep  did  when  Cousin  Ann  told  him  to  get  up 
on  the  couch,  and  took  up  his  needle  and  awl. 

"But  I  could  read  something  aloud,"  said 
Betsy,  feeling  very  sorry  for  him.  "At  least 
I  think  I  could.    I  never  did,  except  at  school." 

"What  shall  we  have,  Mother?"  asked  Uncle 
Henry  eagerly. 

"Oh,  I  don't  know.  What  have  we  got  in 
this  bookcase?"  said  Aunt  Abigail.  "It's 
pretty  cold  to  go  into  the  parlor  to  the  other 
one."     She  leaned  forward,  ran  her  fat  fore- 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  129 

finger  over  the  worn  old  volumes,  and  took 
out  a  battered,  blue-covered  book.     " Scott?" 

"Gosh,  yes!"  said  Uncle  Henry,  his  eyes 
shining.    "The  staggit  eve!" 

At  least  that  was  the  way  it  sounded  to 
Betsy,  but  when  she  took  the  book  and  looked 
where  Aunt  Abigail  pointed  she  read  it  cor- 
rectly, though  in  a  timid,  uncertain  voice.  She 
was  very  proud  to  think  she  could  please  a 
grown-up  so  much  as  she  was  evidently  pleas- 
ing Uncle  Henry,  but  the  idea  of  reading  aloud 
for  people  to  hear,  not  for  a  teacher  to  correct, 
was  unheard-of. 

The  Stag  at  eve  had  drunk  his  fill 
Where  danced  the  moon  on  Monan's  rill, 

she  began,  and  it  was  as  though  she  had 
stepped  into  a  boat  and  was  swept  off  by  a 
strong  current.  She  did  not  know  what  all  the 
words  meant,  and  she  could  not  pronounce  a 
good  many  of  the  names,  but  nobody  inter- 
rupted to  correct  her,  and  she  read  on  and  on, 
steadied  by  the  strongly-marked  rhythm,  drawn 


130  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

forward  swiftly  from  one  clanging,  sonorous 
rhyme  to  another.  Uncle  Henry  nodded  his 
head  in  time  to  the  rise  and  fall  of  her  voice 
and  now  and  then  stopped  his  work  to  look 
at  her  with  bright,  eager,  old  eyes.  He  knew 
some  of  the  places  by  heart  evidently,  for 
once  in  a  while  his  voice  wouldyjoin  the  little 
girl's  for  a  couplet  or  two.  They  chanted  to- 
gether thus: 

A  moment  listened  to  the  cry 
That  thickened  as  the  chase  drew  nigh, 
Then,  as  the  headmost  foes  appeared, 
With  one  brave  bound,  the  copse  he  cleared. 

At  the  last  line  Uncle  Henry  flung  his  arm 
out  wide,  and  the  child  felt  as  though  the  deer 
had  made  his  great  leap  there,  before  her  eyes. 

"I've  seen  'em  jump  just  like  that,"  broke  in 
Uncle  Henry.  "A  two-three-hundred-pound 
stag  go  up  over  a  four-foot  fence  just  like  a 
piece  of  thistledown  in  the  wind." 

"Uncle  Henry,"  asked  Elizabeth  Ann,  "what 
is  a  copse?" 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  131 

"I  don't  know,"  said  Uncle  Henry  indiffer- 
ently. ' '  Something  in  the  woods,  must  be.  Un- 
derbrush most  likely.  You  can  always  tell 
words  you  don't  know  by  the  sense  of  the  whole 
thing.    Go  on." 

And  stretching  forward,  free  and  far, 

The  child's  voice  took  up  the  chant  again.  She 
read  faster  and  faster  as  it  got  more  exciting. 
Uncle  Henry  joined  in  on 

For,  jaded  now  and  spent  with  toil, 
Embossed  with  foam  and  dark  with  soil, 
While  every  gasp  with  sobs  he  drew, 
The  laboring  stag  strained  full  in  view. 

The  little  girl's  heart  beat  fast.  She  fled 
along  through  the  next  lines,  stumbling  des- 
perately over  the  hard  words  but  seeing  the 
headlong  chase  through  them  clearly  as  through 
tree-trunks  in  a  forest.  Uncle  Henry  broke  in 
in  a  triumphant  shout: 

The  wily  quarry  shunned  the  shock 
And  turned  him  from  the  opposing  rock ; 


132  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Then  dashing  down  a  darksome  glen, 
Soon  lost  to  hound  and  hunter's  ken, 
In  the  deep  Trossach  's  wildest  nook 
His  solitary  refuge  took. 

"Oh  my!"  cried  Elizabeth  Ann,  laying  down 
the  book.  "He  got  away,  didn't  he?  I  was 
so  afraid  he  wouldn't!" 

"I  can  just  hear  those  dogs  yelping,  can't 
you!"  said  Uncle  Henry. 

Yelled  on  the  view  the  opening  pack. 

"Sometimes  you  hear  'em  that  way  up  on 
the  slope  of  Hemlock  Mountain  back  of  us, 
when  they  get  to  running  a  deer." 

"What  say  we  have  some  pop-corn!"  sug- 
gested Aunt  Abigail.  "Betsy,  don't  you  want 
to  pop  us  some?" 

"I  never  did,"  said  the  little  girl,  but  in  a 
less  doubtful  tone  than  she  had  ever  used  with 
that  phrase  so  familiar  to  her.  A  dim  notion 
was  growing  up  in  her  mind  that  the  fact  that 
she  had  never  done  a  thing  was  no  proof  that 
she  couldn't. 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  133 

"111  show  you,"  said  Uncle  Henry.  He 
reached  down  a  couple  of  ears  from  a  big  yel- 
low cluster  hanging  on  the  wall,  and  he  and 
Betsy  shelled  them  into  the  popper,  popped  it 
full  of  snowy  kernels,  buttered  it,  salted  it, 
and  took  it  back  to  the  table. 

It  was  just  as  she  was  eating  her  first  am- 
brosial mouthful  that  the  door  opened  and  a 
fur-capped  head  was  thrust  in.  A  man's  voice 
said:  "Evenin',  folks.  No,  I  can't  stay.  I 
was  down  at  the  village  just  now,  and  thought 
I  'd  ask  for  any  mail  down  our  way. ' '  He  tossed 
a  newspaper  and  a  letter  on  the  table  and  was 
gone. 

The  letter  was  addressed  to  Elizabeth  Ann 
and  it  was  from  Aunt  Frances.  She  read  it  to 
herself  while  Uncle  Henry  read  the  newspaper. 
Aunt  Frances  wrote  that  she  had  been  per- 
fectly horrified  to  learn  that  Cousin  Molly  had 
not  kept  Elizabeth  Ann  with  her,  and  that  she 
would  never  forgive  her  for  that  cruelty.  And 
when  she  thought  that  her  darling  was  at  Put- 
ney  Farm  .    .    .  !     Her   blood   ran   cold.     It 


134  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

positively  did!  It  was  too  dreadful.  But  it 
couldn't  be  helped,  for  a  time  anyhow,  because 
Aunt  Harriet  was  really  very  sick.  Elizabeth 
Ann  would  have  to  be  a  dear,  brave  child  and 
endure  it  as  best  she  could.  And  as  soon  .  .  . 
oh,  as  soon  as  ever  she  could,  Aunt  Frances 
would  come  and  take  her  away  from  them. 
"Don't  cry  too  much,  darling  ...  it  breaks 
my  heart  to  think  of  you  there!  Try  to 
be  cheerful,  dearest!  Try  to  bear  it  for 
the  sake  of  your  distracted,  loving  Aunt 
Frances." 

Elizabeth  Ann  looked  up  from  this  letter 
and  across  the  table  at  Aunt  Abigail's  rosy, 
wrinkled  old  face,  bent  over  her  darning. 
Uncle  Henry  laid  the  paper  down,  took  a  big 
mouthful  of  pop-corn,  and  beat  time  silently 
with  his  hand.  When  he  could  speak  he  mur- 
mured : 

An  hundred  dogs  bayed  deep  and  strong, 
Clattered  an  hundred  steeds  along. 

Old  Shep  woke  up  with  a  snort  and  Aunt 


CONVERSATION  IN  A  BOOK  135 

Abigail  fed  him  a  handful  of  pop-corn.  Little 
Eleanor  stirred  in  her  sleep,  stretched,  yawned, 
and  nestled  down  into  a  ball  again  on  the  little 
girl's  lap.  Betsy  could  feel  in  her  own  body 
the  rhythmic  vibration  of  the  kitten's  contented 
purr. 

Aunt  Abigail  looked  up:  "Finished  your 
letter?  I  hope  Harriet  is  no  worse.  What 
does  Frances  say?" 

Elizabeth  Ann  blushed  a  deep  red  and 
crushed  the  letter  together  in  her  hand.  She 
felt  ashamed  and  she  did  not  know  why.  "Aunt 
Frances  says,  .  .  .  Aunt  Frances  says,  ..." 
she  began,  hesitating.  "She  says  Aunt  Har- 
riet is  still  pretty  sick."  She  stopped,  drew  a 
long  breath,  and  went  on,  "And  she  sends  her 
love  to  you." 

Now  Aunt  Frances  hadn't  done  anything  of 
the  kind,  so  this  was  a  really  whopping  fib. 
But  Elizabeth  Ann  didn't  care  if  it  was.  It 
made  her  feel  less  ashamed,  though  she  did  not 
know  why.  She  took  another  mouthful  of 
pop-corn  and  stroked  Eleanor's  back. 


136  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Uncle  Henry  got  up  and  stretched.  "It's 
time  to  go  to  bed,  folks,"  he  said.  As  he 
wound  the  clock  Betsy  heard  him  murmuring: 

But  when  the  sun  his  beacon  red.  .  .  . 


CHAPTER  VII 

ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  IN  AN 
EXAMINATION 

I  wonder  if  you  can  guess  the  name  of  a 
little  girl  who,  about  a  month  after  this,  was 
walking  along  through  the  melting  snow  in  the 
woods  with  a  big  black  dog  running  circles 
around  her.  Yes,  all  alone  in  the  woods  with  a 
terrible  great  dog  beside  her,  and  yet  not  a  bit 
afraid.  You  don't  suppose  it  could  be  Eliza- 
beth Ann?  v  Well,  whoever  she  was,  she  had 
something  on  her  mind,  for  she  walked  more 
and  more  slowly  and  had  only  a  very  absent- 
minded  pat  for  the  dog's  head  when  he  thrust 
it  up  for  a  caress.  When  the  wood  road  led 
into  a  clearing  in  which  there  was  a  rough  lit- 
tle house  of  slabs,  the  child  stopped  altogether, 
and,  looking  down,  began  nervously  to  draw 
lines  in  the  snow  with  her  overshoe. 

137 


138  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

You  see,  something  perfectly  dreadful  had 
happened  in  school  that  day.  The  Superin- 
tendent, the  all-important,  seldom-seen  Superin- 
tendent, came  to  visit  the  school  and  the  chil- 
dren were  given  some  examinations  so  he 
could  see  how  they  were  getting  on. 

Now,  you  know  what  an  examination  did  to 
Elizabeth  Ann.    Or  haven't  I  told  you  yet? 

Well,  if  I  haven't,  it's  because  words  fail 
me.  If  there  is  anything  horrid  that  an  ex- 
amination didn't  do  to  Elizabeth  Ann,  I  have 
yet  to  hear  of  it.  It  began  years  ago,  before 
ever  she  went  to  school,  when  she  heard  Aunt 
Frances  talking  about  how  she  had  dreaded  ex- 
aminations when  she  was  a  child,  and  how  they 
dried  up  her  mouth  and  made  her  ears  ring 
and  her  head  ache  and  her  knees  get  all  weak 
and  her  mind  a  perfect  blank,  so  that  she 
didn't  know  what  two  and  two  made.  Of 
course  Elizabeth  Ann  didn't  feel  all  those 
things  right  off  at  her  first  examination,  but  by 
the  time  she  had  had  several  and  had  rushed 
to  tell  Aunt  Frances  about  how  awful  they 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  139 

were  and  the  two  of  them  had  sympathized 
with  one  another  and  compared  symptoms  and 
then  wept  about  her  resulting  low  marks,  why, 
she  not  only  had  all  the  symptoms  Aunt  Fran- 
ces had  ever  had,  but  a  good  many  more  of  her 
own  invention. 

Well,  she  had  had  them  all  and  had  them 
hard  this  afternoon,  when  the  Superintendent 
was  there.  Her  mouth  had  gone  dry  and  her 
knees  had  shaken  and  her  elbows  had  felt  as 
though  they  had  no  more  bones  in  them  than 
so  much  jelly,  and  her  eyes  had  smarted,  and 
oh,  what  answers  she  had  made !  That  dread- 
ful tight  panic  had  clutched  at  her  throat  when- 
ever the  Superintendent  had  looked  at  her,  and 
she  had  disgraced  herself  ten  times  over.  She 
went  hot  and  cold  to  think  of  it,  and  felt  quite 
sick  with  hurt  vanity.  She  who  did  so  well 
every  day  and  was  so  much  looked  up  to  by 
her  classmates,  what  must  they  be  thinking  of 
her !  To  tell  the  truth,  she  had  been  crying  as 
she  walked  along  through  the  woods,  because 
she  was  so  sorry  for  herself.    Her  eyes  were 


140  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

all  red  still,  and  her  throat  sore  from  the  big 
lump  in  it. 

And  now  she  would  live  it  all  over  again  as 
she  told  the  Putney  cousins.  For  of  course 
they  must  be  told.  She  had  always  told  Aunt 
Frances  everything  that  happened  in  school. 
It  happened  that  Aunt  Abigail  had  been  taking 
a  nap  when  she  got  home  from  school,  and  so 
she  had  come  out  to  the  sap-house,  where 
Cousin  Ann  and  Uncle  Henry  were  making 
syrup,  to  have  it  over  with  as  soon  as  possible. 
She  went  up  to  the  little  slab  house  now,  drag- 
ging her  feet  and  hanging  her  head,  and  opened 
the  door. 

Cousin  Ann,  in  a  very  short  old  skirt  and  a 
man's  coat  and  high  rubber  boots,  was  just 
poking  some  more  wood  into  the  big  fire  which 
blazed  furiously  under  the  broad,  flat  pan 
where  the  sap  was  boiling.  The  rough,  brown 
hut  was  filled  with  white  steam  and  that  sweet- 
est of  all  odors,  hot  maple  syrup.  Cousin  Ann 
turned  her  head,  her  face  very  red  with  the 
heat  of  the  fire,  and  nodded  at  the  child. 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  141 

" Hello,  Betsy,  you're  just  in  time.  I've 
saved  out  a  cupful  of  hot  syrup  for  you,  all 
ready  to  wax." 

Betsy  hardly  heard  this,  although  she  had 
been  wild  about  waxed  sugar  on  snow  ever 
since  her  very  first  taste  of  it.  "Cousin  Ann," 
she  said  unhappily, ' '  the  Superintendent  visited 
our  school  this  afternoon." 

"Did  he?"  said  Cousin  Ann,  dipping  a  ther- 
mometer into  the  boiling  syrup. 

"Yes,  and  we  had  examinations!"  said  Betsy. 

"Did  you!"  said  Cousin  Ann,  holding  the 
thermometer  up  to  the  light  and  looking  at  it. 

"And  you  know  how  perfectly  awful  exami- 
nations make  you  feel,"  said  Betsy,  very  near 
to  tears  again. 

"Why,  no,"  said  Cousin  Ann,  sorting  over 
syrup  tins.  "They  never  made  me  feel  awful. 
I  thought  they  were  sort  of  fun." 

"Fun!"  cried  Betsy,  indignantly,  staring 
through  the  beginnings  of  her  tears. 

"Why,  yes.  Like  taking  a  dare,  don't  you 
know.    Somebody  stumps  you  to  jump  off  the 


142  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

hitching-post,  and  you  do  it  to  show  'em.  I  al- 
ways used  to  think  examinations  were  like  that. 
Somebody  stumps  you  to  spell  'pneumonia,' 
and  you  do  it  to  show  'em.  Here's  your  cup  of 
syrup.  You'd  better  go  right  out  and  wax  it 
while  it's  hot." 

Elizabeth  Ann  automatically  took  the  cup 
in  her  hand,  but  she  did  not  look  at  it.  ' '  But  sup- 
posing you  get  so  scared  you  can't  spell  'pneu- 
monia' or  anything  else!"  she  said  feelingly. 
"That's  what  happened  to  me.  You  know  how 
your  mouth  gets  all  dry  and  your  knees  ..." 
She  stopped.  Cousin  Ann  had  said  she  did  not 
know  all  about  those  things.  "Well,  anyhow,  I 
got  so  scared  I  could  hardly  stand  up!  And  I 
made  the  most  awful  mistakes — things  I  know 
just  as  well!  I  spelled  'doubt'  without  any  b 
and  'separate'  with  an  e,  and  I  said  Iowa 
was  bounded  on  the  north  by  Wisconsin,  and 
I  .    .    ." 

"Oh,  well,"  said  Cousin  Ann,  "it  doesn't 
matter  if  you  really  know  the  right  answers, 
does  it?    That's  the  important  thing." 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  143 

This  was  an  idea  which  had  never  in  all  her 
life  entered  Betsy's  brain  and  she  did  not  take 
it  in  at  all  now.  She  only  shook  her  head  mis- 
erably and  went  on  in  a  doleful  tone.  "And  I 
said  13  and  8  are  22 1  and  I  wrote  March  without 
any  capital  M,  and  I  .   .   . " 

"Look  here,  Betsy,  do  you  want  to  tell  me 
all  this  f ' '  Cousin  Ann  spoke  in  the  quick,  ring- 
ing voice  she  had  once  in  a  while  which  made 
everybody,  from  old  Shep  up,  open  his  eyes  and 
get  his  wits  about  him.  Betsy  gathered  hers 
and  thought  hard;  and  she  came  to  an  unex- 
pected conclusion.  No,  she  didn't  really  want 
to  tell  Cousin  Ann  all  about  it.  "Why  was  she 
doing  it?  Because  she  thought  that  was  the 
thing  to  do.  "Because  if  you  don't  really  want 
to,"  went  on  Cousin  Ann,  "I  don't  see  that  it's 
doing  anybody  any  good.  I  guess  Hemlock 
Mountain  will  stand  right  there  just  the 
same  even  if  you  did  forget  to  put  a  b  in 
'doubt.'  And  your  syrup  will  be  too  cool  to 
wax  right  if  you  don't  take  it  out  pretty 
soon." 


144  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

She  turned  back  to  stoke  the  fire,  and  Eliza- 
beth Ann,  in  a  daze,  found  herself  walking  out 
of  the  door.  It  fell  shut  after  her,  and  there 
she  was  under  the  clear,  pale-blue  sky,  with  the 
sun  just  hovering  over  the  rim  of  Hemlock 
Mountain.  She  looked  up  at  the  big  mountains, 
all  blue  and  silver  with  shadows  and  snow,  and 
wondered  what  in  the  world  Cousin  Ann  had 
meant.  Of  course  Hemlock  Mountain  would 
stand  there  just  the  same.  But  what  of  it? 
What  did  that  have  to  do  with  her  arithmetic, 
wjth  anything?  She  had  failed  in  her  examina- 
tion, hadn't  she? 

She  found  a  clean  white  snow-bank  under  a 
pine-tree,  and,  setting  her  cup  of  syrup  down  in 
a  safe  place,  began  to  pat  the  snow  down  hard 
to  make  the  right  bed  for  the  waxing  of  the 
syrup.  The  sun,  very  hot  for  that  late  March 
day,  brought  out  strongly  the  tarry  perfume  of 
the  big  pine-tree.  Near  her  the  sap  dripped 
musically  into  a  bucket,  already  half  full,  hung 
on  a  maple-tree.  A  blue- jay  rushed  suddenly 
through  the  upper  branches  of  the  wood,  his 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  145 

screaming  and  chattering  voice  sounding  like 
noisy  children  at  play. 

Elizabeth  Ann  took  up  her  cup  and  poured 
some  of  the  thick,  hot  syrup  out  on  the  hard 
snow,  making  loops  and  curves  as  she  poured. 
It  stiffened  and  hardened  at  once,  and  she  lifted 
up  a  great  coil  of  it,  threw  her  head  back,  and 
let  it  drop  into  her  mouth.  Concentrated  sweet- 
ness of  summer  days  was  in  that  mouthful,  part 
of  it  still  hot  and  aromatic,  part  of  it  icy  and 
wet  with  melting  snow.  She  crunched  it  all 
together  with  her  strong,  child's  teeth  into  a 
delicious,  big  lump  and  sucked  on  it  dreamily, 
her  eyes  on  the  rim  of  Hemlock  Mountain,  high 
above  her  there,  the  snow  on  it  bright  golden 
in  the  sunlight.  Uncle  Henry  had  promised  to 
take  her  up  to  the  top  as  soon  as  the  snow 
went  off.  She  wondered  what  the  top  of  a 
mountain  would  be  like.  Uncle  Henry  had  said 
the  main  thing  was  that  you  could  see  so  much 
of  the  world  at  once.  He  said  it  was  too  queer 
the  way  your  own  house  and  big  barn  and  great 
fields  looked  like  little  toy  things  that  weren't 


146  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

of  any  account.    It  was  because  you  could  see 
so  much  more  than*  just  the  .    .    . 

She  heard  an  imploring  whine,  and  a  cold 
nose  was  thrust  into  her  hand!  Why,  there 
was  old  Shep  begging  for  his  share  of  waxed 
sugar.  He  loved  it,  though  it  did  stick  to  his 
teeth  so !  She  poured  out  another  lot  and  gave 
half  of  it  to  Shep.  It  immediately  stuck  his 
jaws  together  tight,  and  he  began  pawing  at  his 
mouth  and  shaking  his  head  till  Betsy  had  to 
laugh.  Then  he  managed  to  pull  his  jaws  apart 
and  chewed  loudly  and  visibly,  tossing  his  head, 
opening  his  mouth  wide  till  Betsy  could  see  the 
sticky,  brown  candy  draped  in  melting  festoons 
all  over  his  big  white  teeth  and  red  gullet.  Then 
with  a  gulp  he  had  swallowed  it  all  down  and 
was  whining  for  more,  striking  softly  at  the  lit- 
tle girl's  skirt  with  his  forepaw.  "Oh,  you  eat 
it  too  fast!"  cried  Betsy,  but  she  shared  her 
next  lot  with  him  too.  The  sun  had  gone  down 
over  Hemlock  Mountain  by  this  time,  and  the 
big  slope  above  her  was  all  deep  blue  shadow. 
The  mountain  looked  much  higher  now  as  the 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  147 

dusk  began  to  fall,  and  loomed  up  bigger  and 
bigger  as  though  it  reached  to  the  sky.  It  was 
no  wonder  houses  looked  small  from  its  top. 
Betsy  ate  the  last  of  her  sugar,  looking  up  at  the 
quiet  giant  there,  towering  grandly  above  her. 
There  was  no  lump  in  her  throat  now.  And, 
although  she  still  thought  she  did  not  know 
what  in  the  world  Cousin  Ann  meant  by  saying 
that  about  Hemlock  Mountain  and  her  exami- 
nation, it's  my  opinion  that  she  had  made  a 
very  good  beginning  of  an  understanding. 

She  was  just  picking  up  her  cup  to  take  it 
back  to  the  sap-house  when  Shep  growled  a 
little  and  stood  with  his  ears  and  tail  up,  look- 
ing down  the  road.  Something  was  coming 
down  that  road  in  the  blue,  clear  twilight,  some- 
thing that  was  making  a  very  queer  noise.  It 
sounded  almost  like  somebody  crying.  It  was 
somebody  crying!  It  was  a  child  crying.  It 
was  a  little,  little  girl.  .  .  .  Betsy  could  see  her 
now  .  .  .  stumbling  along  and  crying  as  though 
her  heart  would  break.  Why,  it  was  little  Molly, 
her   own  particular  charge   at  school,  whose 


148  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

reading  lesson  she  heard  every  day.  Betsy  and 
Shep  ran  to  meet  her.  "What's  the  matter, 
Molly?  What's  the  matter?"  Betsy  knelt 
down  and  put  her  arms  around  the  weeping 
child.  "Did  you  fall  down?  Did  you  hurt 
you  ?  What  are  you  doing  'way  off  here  ?  Did 
you  lose  your  way?" 

"I  don't  want  to  go  away!  I  don't  want  to 
go  away!"  said  Molly  over  and  over,  clinging 
tightly  to  Betsy.  It  was  a  long  time  before 
Betsy  could  quiet  her  enough  to  find  out  what 
had  happened.  Then  she  made  out  between 
Molly's  sobs  that  her  mother  had  been  taken 
suddenly  sick  and  had  to  go  away  to  a  hos- 
pital, and  that  left  nobody  at  home  to  take  care 
of  Molly,  and  she  was  to  be  sent  away  to  some 
strange  relatives  in  the  city  who  didn't  want 
her  at  all  and  who  said  so  right  out.  .   .   . 

Oh,  Elizabeth  Ann  knew  all  about  that !  and 
her  heart  swelled  big  with  sympathy.  For  a 
moment  she  stood  again  out  on  the  sidewalk  in 
front  of  the  Lathrop  house  with  old  Mrs.  Lath- 
rop's  ungracious  white  head  bobbing  from  a 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  149 

window,  and  knew  again  that  ghastly  feeling  of 
being  unwanted.  Oh,  she  knew  why  little  Molly 
was  crying!  And  she  shut  her  hands  together 
hard  and  made  up  her  mind  that  she  would 
help  her  out! 

Do  you  know  what  she  did,  right  off,  without 
thinking  about  it?  She  didn't  go  and  look  up 
Aunt  Abigail.  She  didn't  wait  till  Uncle  Henry 
came  back  from  his  round  of  emptying  sap 
buckets  into  the  big  tub  on  his  sled.  As  fast 
as  her  feet  could  carry  her  she  flew  back  to 
Cousin  Ann  in  the  sap-house.  I  can't  tell  you 
(except  again  that  Cousin  Ann  was  Cousin 
Ann)  why  it  was  that  Betsy  ran  so  fast  to  her 
and  was  so  sure  that  everything  would  be  all 
right  as  soon  as  Cousin  Ann  knew  about  it; 
but  whatever  the  reason  was  it  was  a  good  one, 
for,  though  Cousin  Ann  did  not  stop  to  kiss 
Molly  or  even  to  look  at  her  more  than  one 
sharp  first  glance,  she  said  after  a  moment's 
pause,  during  which  she  filled  a  syrup  can  and 
screwed  the  cover  down  very  tight:  "Well,  if 
her  folks  will  let  her  stay,  how  would  you  like 


150  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

to  have  Molly  come  and  stay  with  us  till  her 
mother  gets  back  from  the  hospital?  Now 
you've  got  a  room  of  your  own,  I  guess  if  you 
wanted  to  you  could  have  her  sleep  with  you." 

"Oh,  Molly,  Molly,  Molly!"  shouted  Betsy, 
jumping  up  and  down,  and  then  hugging  the 
little  girl  with  all  her  might.  "Oh,  it  will  be 
like  having  a  little  sister!" 

Cousin  Ann  sounded  a  dry,  warning  note: 
"Don't  be  too  sure  her  folks  will  let  her.  We 
don't  know  about  them  yet." 

Betsy  ran  to  her,  and  caught  her  hand,  look- 
ing up  at  her  with  shining  eyes.  "Cousin  Ann, 
if  you  go  to  see  them  and  ask  them,  they  will ! ' ' 

This  made  even  Cousin  Ann  give  a  little 
abashed  smile  of  pleasure,  although  she  made 
her  face  grave  again  at  once  and  said :  ' '  You  'd 
better  go  along  back  to  the  house  now,  Betsy. 
It's  time  for  you  to  help  Mother  with  the  sup- 
per." 

The  two  children  trotted  back  along  the  dark- 
ening wood  road,  Shep  running  before  them, 
little  Molly  clinging  fast  to  the  older  child's 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  151 

hand.  "Aren't  you  ever  afraid,  Betsy,  in  the 
woods  this  way?"  she  asked  admiringly,  look- 
ing about  her  with  timid  eyes. 

"Oh,  no!"  said  Betsy,  protectingly ;  "there's 
nothing  to  be  afraid  of,  except  getting  off  on 
the  wrong  fork  of  the  road,  near  the  Wolf  Pit. ' ' 

"Oh,  owl"  said  Molly,  scringing.  "What's 
the  Wolf  Pit?    What  an  awful  name!" 

Betsy  laughed.  She  tried  to  make  her  laugh 
sound  brave  like  Cousin  Ann's,  which  always 
seemed  so  scornful  of  being  afraid.  As  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  she  was  beginning  to  fear  that  they 
had  made  the  wrong  turn,  and  she  was  not  quite 
sure  that  she  could  find  the  way  home.  But  she 
put  this  out  of  her  mind  and  walked  along  very 
fast,  peering  ahead  into  the  dusk.  "Oh,  it 
hasn't  anything  to  do  with  wolves,"  she  said 
in  answer  to  Molly's  question;  "anyhow,  not 
now.  It's  just  a  big,  deep  hole  in  the  ground 
where  a  brook  had  dug  out  a  cave.  .  .  .  Uncle 
Henry  told  me  all  about  it  when  he  showed  it  to 
me  .  .  .  and  then  part  of  the  roof  caved  in; 
sometimes  there's  ice  in  the  corner  of  the  cov- 


152  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ered  part  all  the  summer,  Aunt  Abigail 
says." 

"Why  do  you  call  it  the  Wolf  Pit?"  asked 
Molly,  walking  very  close  to  Betsy  and  holding 
very  tightly  to  her  hand. 

"Oh,  long,  ever  so  long  ago,  when  the  first 
settlers  came  up  here,  they  heard  a  wolf  howl- 
ing all  night,  and  when  it  didn't  stop  in  the 
morning,  they  came  up  here  on  the  mountain 
and  found  a  wolf  had  fallen  in  and  couldn't  get 
out." 

"My!    I  hope  they  killed  him!"  said  Molly. 

"Oh,  gracious!  that  was  more  than  a  hun- 
dred years  ago,"  said  Betsy.  She  was  not 
thinking  of  what  she  was  saying.  She  was 
thinking  that  if  they  were  on  the  right  road 
they  ought  to  be  home  by  this  time.  She  was 
thinking  that  the  right  road  ran  down  hill  to 
the  house  all  the  way,  and  that  this  certainly 
seemed  to  be  going  up  a  little.  She  was  won- 
dering what  had  become  of  Shep.  "Stand  here 
just  a  minute,  Molly,"  she  said.  "I  want  .  .  . 
I  just  want  to  go  ahead  a  little  bit  and  see  .  .  . 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  153 

and  see  ..."  She  darted  on  around  a  curve  of 
the  road  and  stood  still,  her  heart  sinking.  The 
road  turned  there  and  led  straight  up  the  moun- 
tain! 

For  just  a  moment  the  little  girl  felt  a  wild 
impulse  to  burst  out  in  a  shriek  for  Aunt 
Frances,  and  to  run  crazily  away,  anywhere  so 
long  as  she  was  running.  But  the  thought  of 
Molly  standing  back  there,  trustfully  waiting 
to  be  taken  care  of,  shut  Betsy's  lips  together 
hard  before  her  scream  of  fright  got  out.  She 
stood  still,  thinking.  Now  she  mustn't  get 
frightened.  All  they  had  to  do  was  to  walk 
back  along  the  road  till  they  came  to  the  fork 
and  then  make  the  right  turn.  But  what  if 
they  didn't  get  back  to  the  turn  till  it  was  so 
dark  they  couldn't  see  it  .  .  A  Well,  she 
mustn't  think  of  that.  She  ran  back,  calling, 
1 ' Come  on,  Molly,"  in  a  tone  she  tried  to  make 
as  firm  as  Cousin  Ann's.  "I  guess  we  have 
made  the  wrong  turn  after  all.  We'd  bet- 
ter ..." 

But    there    was    no    Molly    there.     In    the 


154  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

brief  moment  Betsy  had  stood  thinking,  Molly- 
had  disappeared.  The  long,  shadowy  wood 
road  held  not  a  trace  of  her. 

Then  Betsy  was  frightened  and  then  she  did 
begin  to  scream,  at  the  top  of  her  voice,  "Molly ! 
Molly!"  She  was  beside  herself  with  terror, 
and  started  back  hastily  to  hear  Molly's  voice, 
very  faint,  apparently  coming  from  the  ground 
under  her  feet. 

"Ow!  Ow!  Betsy!  Get  me  out!  Get  me 
out!" 

"Where  are  you?"  shrieked  Betsy. 

"I  don't  know!"  came  Molly's  sobbing  voice. 
"I  just  moved  the  least  little  bit  out  of  the 
road,  and  slipped  on  the  ice  and  began  to  slide 
and  I  couldn't  stop  myself  and  I  fell  down  into 
a  deep  hole!" 

Betsy's  head  felt  as  though  her  hair  were 
standing  up  straight  on  end  with  horror. 
Molly  must  have  fallen  down  into  the  Wolf  Pit ! 
Yes,  they  were  quite  near  it.  She  remembered 
now  that  big  white-birch  tree  stood  right  at 
the  place  where  the  brook  tumbled  over  the 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  155 

edge  and  fell  into  it.  Although  she  was  dread- 
fully afraid  of  falling  in  herself,  she  went  cau- 
tiously over  to  this  tree,  feeling  her  way  with 
her  foot  to  make  sure  she  did  not  slip,  and 
peered  down  into  the  cavernous  gloom  below. 
Yes,  there  was  Molly's  little  face,  just  a  white 
speck.  The  child  was  crying,  sobbing,  and  hold- 
ing up  her  arms  to  Betsy. 

"Are  you  hurt,  Molly?" 

"No.  I  fell  into  a  big  snow-bank,  but  I'm 
all  wet  and  frozen  and  I  want  to  get  out!  I 
want  to  get  out ! ' ' 

Betsy  held  on  to  the  birch-tree.  Her  head 
whirled.  What  should  she  do!  "Look  here, 
Molly,"  she  called  down,  "I'm  going  to  run 
back  along  to  the  right  road  and  back  to 
the  house  and  get  Uncle  Henry.  He'll  come 
with  a  rope  and  get  you  out!" 

At  this  Molly's  crying  rose  to  a  frantic 
scream.  "Oh,  Betsy,  don't  leave  me  here 
alone!  Don't!  Don't!  The  wolves  will  get  me! 
Betsy,  don't  leave  me  alone!"  The  child  was 
wild  with  terror. 


156  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

"But  I  can't  get  you  out  myself!"  screamed 
back  Betsy,  crying  herself.  Her  teeth  were 
chattering  with  the  cold. 

"Don't  go!  Don't  go!"  came  up  from  the 
darkness  of  the  pit  in  a  piteous  howl.  Betsy 
made  a  great  effort  and  stopped  crying.  She 
sat  down  on  a  stone  and  tried  to  think.  And 
this  is  what  came  into  her  mind  as  a  guide: 
"What  would  Cousin  Ann  do  if  she  were  here? 
She  wouldn't  cry.  She  would  think  of  some- 
thing." 

Betsy  looked  around  her  desperately.  The 
first  thing  she  saw  was  the  big  limb  of  a  pine- 
tree,  broken  off  by  the  wind,  which  half  lay  and 
half  slantingly  stood  up  against  a  tree  a  little 
distance  above  the  mouth  of  the  pit.  It  had 
been  there  so  long  that  the  needles  had  all  dried 
and  fallen  off,  and  the  skeleton  of  the  branch 
with  the  broken  stubs  looked  like  .  .  .  yes,  it 
looked  like  a  ladder!  That  was  what  Cousin 
Ann  would  have  done ! 

"Wait  a  minute!  Wait  a  minute,  Molly!" 
she  called  wildly  down  the  pit,  warm  all  over  in 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  157 

excitement.  "Now  listen.  You  go  off  there  in 
a  corner,  where  the  ground  makes  a  sort  of 
roof.  I'm  going  to  throw  down  something  you 
can  climb  up  on,  maybe." 

"Ow!  Ow,  it'll  hit  me!"  cried  poor  little 
Molly,  more  and  more  frightened.  But  she 
scrambled  off  under  her  shelter  obediently, 
while  Betsy  struggled  with  the  branch.  It  was 
so  firmly  imbedded  in  the  snow  that  at  first  she 
could  not  budge  it  at  all.  But  after  she  cleared 
that  away  and  pried  hard  with  the  stick  she  was 
using  as  a  lever  she  felt  it  give  a  little.  She 
bore  down  with  all  her  might,  throwing  her 
weight  again  and  again  on  her  lever,  and  finally 
felt  the  big  branch  perceptibly  move.  After  that 
it  was  easier,  as  its  course  was  down  hill  over 
the  snow  to  the  mouth  of  the  pit.  Glowing,  and 
pushing,  wet  with  perspiration,  she  slowly 
maneuvered  it  along  to  the  edge,  turned  it 
squarely,  gave  it  a  great  shove,  and  leaned  over 
anxiously.  Then  she  gave  a  great  sigh  of  re- 
lief! Just  as  she  had  hoped,  it  went  down 
sharp  end  first  and  stuck  fast  in  the  snow 


158  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

which  had  saved  Molly  from  broken  bones.  She 
was  so  out  of  breath  with  her  work  that  for  a 
moment  she  could  not  speak.  Then,  "Molly, 
there !  Now  I  guess  you  can  climb  up  to  where 
I  can  reach  you." 

Molly  made  a  rush  for  any  way  out  of  her 
prison,  and  climbed,  like  the  little  practised 
squirrel  that  she  was,  up  from  one  stub  to  an- 
other to  the  top  of  the  branch.  She  was  still 
below  the  edge  of  the  pit  there,  but  Betsy  lay 
flat  down  on  the  snow  and  held  out  her  hands. 
Molly  took  hold  hard,  and,  digging  her  toes  into 
the  snow,  slowly  wormed  her  way  up  to  the 
surface  of  the  ground. 

It  was  then,  at  that  very  moment,  that  Shep 
came  bounding  up  to  them,  barking  loudly,  and 
after  him  Cousin  Ann  striding  along  in  her 
rubber  boots,  with  a  lantern  in  her  hand  and  a 
rather  anxious  look  on  her  face. 

She  stopped  short  and  looked  at  the  two  little 
girls,  covered  with  snow,  their  faces  flaming 
with  excitement,  and  at  the  black  hole  gaping 
behind  them.    "I  always  told  Father  we  ought 


ELIZABETH  ANN  FAILS  159 

to  put  a  fence  around  that  pit,"  she  said  in  a 
matter-of-fact  voice.  "Some  day  a  sheep's 
going  to  fall  down  there.  Shep  came  along  to 
the  house  without  you,  and  we  thought  most 
likely  you'd  taken  the  wrong  turn." 

Betsy  felt  terribly  aggrieved.  She  wanted 
to  be  petted  and  praised  for  her  heroism.  She 
wanted  Cousin  Ann  to  realise  ...  oh,  if  Aunt 
Frances  were  only  there,  she  would  realize  .  .  .  ! 

"I  fell  down  in  the  hole,  and  Betsy  wanted  to 
go  and  get  Mr.  Putney,  but  I  wouldn't  let  her, 
and  so  she  threw  down  a  big  branch  and  I 
climbed  out,"  explained  Molly,  who,  now  that 
her  danger  was  past,  took  Betsy's  action  quite 
as  a  matter  of  course. 

"Oh,  that  was  how  it  happened,"  said  Cousin 
Ann.  She  looked  down  the  hole  and  saw  the  big 
branch,  and  looked  back  and  saw  the  long  trail 
of  crushed  snow  where  Betsy  had  dragged  it. 
"Well,  now,  that  was  quite  a  good  idea  for  a 
little  girl  to  have,"  she  said  briefly.  "I  guess 
you'll  do  to  take  care  of  Molly  all  right!" 

She  spoke  in  her  usual  voice  and  immediately 


160  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

drew  the  children  after  her,  but  Betsy's  heart 
was  singing  joyfully  as  she  trotted  along  clasp- 
ing Cousin  Ann's  strong  hand.  Now  she  knew 
that  Cousin  Ann  realized.  .  .  .  She  trotted 
fast,  smiling  to  herself  in  the  darkness. 

"What  made  you  think  of  doing  that?"  asked 
Cousin  Ann  presently,  as  they  approached  the 
house. 

"Why,  I  tried  to  think  what  you  would  have 
done  if  you'd  been  there,"  said  Betsy. 

"Oh!"  said  Cousin  Ann.    "Well.  .  ." 

She  didn't  say  another  word,  but  Betsy, 
glancing  up  into  her  face  as  they  stepped  into 
the  lighted  room,  saw  an  expression  that  made 
her  give  a  little  skip  and  hop  of  joy.  She  had 
pleased  Cousin  Ann. 

That  night,  as  she  lay  in  her  bed,  her  arm 
over  Molly  cuddled  up  warm  beside  her,  she 
remembered,  oh,  ever  so  faintly,  as  something 
of  no  importance,  that  she  had  failed  in  an 
examination  that  afternoon. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
BETSY  STARTS  A  SEWING  SOCIETY 

Betsy  and  Molly  had  taken  Deborah  to  school 
with  them.  Deborah  was  the  old  wooden  doll 
with  brown,  painted  curls.  She  had  lain  in  a 
trunk  almost  ever  since  Aunt  Abigail's  child- 
hood, because  Cousin  Ann  had  never  cared  for 
dolls  when  she  was  a  little  girl.  At  first  Betsy 
had  not  dared  to  ask  to  see  her,  much  less  to 
play  with  her,  but  when  Ellen,  as  she  had  prom- 
ised, came  over  to  Putney  Farm  that  first 
Saturday  she  had  said  right  out,  as  soon  as  she 
landed  in  the  house,  "Oh,  Mrs.  Putney,  can't  we 
play  with  Deborah?"  And  Aunt  Abigail  had 
answered:  "Why  yes,  of  course!  I  knew  there 
was  something  I've  kept  forgetting!"  She 
went  up  with  them  herself  to  the  cold  attic  and 
opened  the  little  hair-trunk  under  the  eaves. 

161 


162  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

There  lay  a  doll,  flat  on  her  back,  looking  up 
at  them  brightly  out  of  her  blue  eyes. 

"Well,  Debby  dear,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  tak- 
ing her  up  gently.  "It's  a  good  long  time  since 
you  and  I  played  under  the  lilac  bushes,  isn't 
it?  I  expect  you've  been  pretty  lonesome  up 
here  all  these  years.  Never  you  mind,  you'll 
have  some  good  times  again,  now."  She  pulled 
down  the  doll's  full,  ruffled  skirt,  straightened 
the  lace  at  the  neck  of  her  dress,  and  held  her 
for  a  moment,  looking  down  at  her  silently. 
You  could  tell  by  the  way  she  spoke,  by  the  way 
she  touched  Deborah,  by  the  way  she  looked  at 
her,  that  she  had  loved  the  doll  very  dearly, 
and  maybe  still  did,  a  little. 

When  she  put  Deborah  into  Betsy's  arms,  the 
child  felt  that  she  was  receiving  something  very 
precious,  almost  something  alive.  She  and 
Ellen  looked  with  delight  at  the  yards  and  yards 
of  picot-edged  ribbon,  sewed  on  by  hand  to  the 
ruffles  of  the  skirt,  and  lifted  up  the  silk  folds 
to  admire  the  carefully  made,  full  petticoats 
and  frilly  drawers,  the   pretty,   soft   old  kid 


Betsy  and  Ellen  and  the  old  do 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  163 

shoes  and  white  stockings.  Aunt  Abigail  looked 
at  them  with  an  absent  smile  on  her  lips,  as 
though  she  were  living  over  old  scenes. 

Finally,  "It's  too  cold  to  play  up  here,"  she 
said,  coming  to  herself  with  a  long  breath. 
"You'd  better  bring  Deborah  and  the  trunk 
down  into  the  south  room."  She  carried  the 
doll,  and  Betsy  and  Ellen  each  took  an  end  of 
the  old  trunk,  no  larger  than  a  modern  suit- 
case. They  settled  themselves  on  the  big  couch, 
back  of  the  table  with  the  lamp.  Old  Shep  was 
on  it,  but  Betsy  coaxed  him  off  by  putting  down 
some  bones  Cousin  Ann  had  been  saving  for 
him.  When  he  finished  those  and  came  back  for 
the  rest  of  his  snooze,  he  found  his  place  occu- 
pied by  the  little  girls,  sitting  cross-legged,  ex- 
amining the  contents  of  the  trunk,  all  spread 
out  around  them.  Shep  sighed  deeply  and  sat 
down  with  his  nose  resting  on  the  couch  near 
Betsy's  knee,  following  all  their  movements 
with  his  kind,  dark  eyes.  Once  in  a  while  Betsy 
stopped  hugging  Deborah  or  exclaiming  over  a 
new  dress  long  enough  to  pat  Shep's  head  and 


164  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

fondle  his  ears.  This  was  what  he  was  waiting 
for,  and  every  time  she  did  it  he  wagged  his 
tail  thumpingly  against  the  floor. 

After  that  Deborah  and  her  trunk  were  kept 
downstairs  where  Betsy  could  play  with  her. 
And  often  she  was  taken  to  school.  You  never 
heard  of  such  a  thing  as  taking  a  doll  to  school, 
did  you  f  Well,  I  told  you  this  was  a  queer,  old- 
fashioned  school  that  any  modern  School  Su- 
perintendent would  sniff  at.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  it  was  not  only  Betsy  who  took  her  doll  to 
school;  all  "the  little  girls  did,  whenever  they 
felt  like  it.  Miss  Benton,  the  teacher,  had  a 
shelf  for  them  in  the  entry-way  where  the  wraps 
were  hung,  and  the  dolls  sat  on  it  and  waited 
patiently  all  through  lessons.  At  recess  time 
or  nooning  each  little  mother  snatched  her  own 
child  and  began  to  play.  As  soon  as  it  grew 
warm  enough  to  play  outdoors  without  just 
racing  around  every  minute  to  keep  from  freez- 
ing to  death,  the  dolls  and  their  mothers  went 
out  to  a  great  pile  of  rocks  at  one  end  of  the 
bare,  stony  field  which  was  the  playground. 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  165 

There  they  sat  and  played  in  the  spring  sun- 
shine, warmer  from  day  to  day.  There  were 
a  great  many  holes  and  shelves  and  pockets  and 
little  caves  in  the  rocks  which  made  lovely  places 
for  playing  keep-house.  Each  little  girl  had 
her  own  particular  cubby-holes  and  "rooms," 
and  they  "visited"  their  dolls  back  and  forth 
all  around  the  pile.  And  as  they  played  they 
talked  very  fast  about  all  sorts  of  things,  being 
little  girls  and  not  boys  who  just  yelled  and 
howled  inarticulately  as  they  played  ball  or 
duck-on-a-rock  or  prisoner's  goal,  racing  and 
running  and  wrestling  noisily  all  around  the 
rocks. 

There  was  one  child  who  neither  played  with 
the  girls  nor  ran  and  whooped  with  the  boys. 
This  was  little  six-year-old  'Lias,  one  of  the 
two  boys  in  Molly's  first  grade.  At  recess  time 
he  generally  hung  about  the  school  door  by 
himself,  looking  moodily  down  and  knocking 
the  toe  of  his  ragged,  muddy  shoe  against  a 
stone.  The  little  girls  were  talking  about  him 
one  day  as  they  played.    "My!   Isn't  that  'Lias 


166  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Brewster  the  horridest-looking  child!"  said 
Eliza,  who  had  the  second  grade  all  to  herself, 
although  Molly  now  read  out  of  the  second 
reader  with  her. 

" Mercy,  yes!  So  ragged!"  said  Anastasia 
Monahan,  called  Stashie  for  short.  She  was  a 
big  girl,  fourteen  years  old,  who  was  in  the 
seventh  grade. 

"He  doesn't  look  as  if  he  ever  combed  his 
hair ! ' '  said  Betsy.  ' '  It  looks  just  like  a  wisp  of 
old  hay." 

"And  sometimes,"  little  Molly  proudly  added 
her  bit  to  the  talk  of  the  older  girls,  "he  for- 
gets to  put  on  any  stockings  and  just  has  his 
dreadful  old  shoes  on  over  his  dirty,  bare 
feet." 

"I  guess  he  hasn't  got  any  stockings  half  the 
time,"  said  big  Stashie  scornfully.  "I  guess 
his  stepfather  drinks  'em  up." 

"How  can  he  drink  up  stockings?"  asked 
Molly,  opening  her  round  eyes  very  wide. 

"Sh!  You  mustn't  ask.  Little  girls  shouldn't 
know  about  such  things,  should  they,  Betsy?" 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  167 

"No  indeed,"  said  Betsy,  looking  mysterious. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  she  herself  had  no  idea 
what  Stashie  meant,  but  she  looked  wise  and 
said  nothing. 

Some  of  the  boys  had  squatted  down  near 
the  rocks  for  a  game  of  marbles  now. 

"Well,  anyhow,"  said  Molly  resentfully,  "I 
don't  care  what  his  stepfather  does  to  his  stock- 
ings. I  wish  'Lias  would  wear  'em  to  school. 
And  lots  of  times  he  hasn't  anything  on  under 
those  horrid  old  overalls  either !  I  can  see  his 
bare  skin  through  the  torn  places." 

"I  wish  he  didn't  have  to  sit  so  near 
me,"  said  Betsy  complainingly.  "He's  so 
dirty." 

"Well,  I  don't  want  him  near  me,  either!" 
cried  all  the  other  little  girls  at  once.  Ealph 
glanced  up  at  them  frowning,  from  where  he 
knelt  with  his  middle  finger  crooked  behind 
a  marble  ready  for  a  shot.  He  looked  as  he 
always  did,  very  rough  and  half-threatening. 
"Oh,  you  girls  make  me  sick!"  he  said.  He 
sent  his  marble  straight  to  the  mark,  pocketed 


168  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

his  opponent's,  and  stood  up,  scowling  at  the 
little  mothers.  "I  guess  if  you  had  to  live 
the  way  he  does  you'd  be  dirty!  Half  the 
time  he  don't  get  anything  to  eat  before  he 
comes  to  school,  and  if  my  mother  didn't  put 
up  some  extra  for  him  in  my  box  he  wouldn't 
get  any  lunch  either.  And  then  you  go  and 
jump  on  him!" 

"Why  doesn't  his  own  mother  put  up  his 
lunch?"  Betsy  challenged  their  critic. 

"He  hasn't  got  any  mother.  She's  dead," 
said  Ralph,  turning  away  with  his  hands  in  his 
pockets.  He  yelled  to  the  boys,  "Come  on,  fel- 
lers, beat-che  to  the  bridge  and  back ! ' '  and  was 
off,  with  the  others  racing  at  his  heels. 

"Well,  anyhow,  I  don't  care;  he  is  dirty  and 
horrid!"  said  Stashie  emphatically,  looking 
over  at  the  drooping,  battered  little  figure,  lean- 
ing against  the  school  door,  listlessly  kicking  at 
a  stone. 

But  Betsy  did  not  say  anything  more  just 
then. 

The   teacher,   who   "boarded    'round,"  was 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  169 

staying  at  Putney  Farm  at  that  time,  and  that 
evening,  as  they  all  sat  around  the  lamp  in  the 
south  room,  Betsy  looked  up  from  her  game  of 
checkers  with  Uncle  Henry  and  asked,  "How 
can  anybody  drink  up  stockings  ?" 

"Mercy,  child!  what  are  you  talking  about?" 
asked  Aunt  Abigail. 

Betsy  repeated  what  Anastasia  Monahan  had 
said,  and  was  flattered  by  the  instant,  rather 
startled  attention  given  her  by  the  grown-ups. 
"Why,  I  didn't  know  that  Bud  Walker  had 
taken  to  drinking  again!"  said  Uncle  Henry. 
"My!    That's  too  bad!" 

"WTio  takes  care  of  that  child  anyhow,  now 
that  poor  Susie  is  dead?"  Aunt  Abigail  asked 
of  everybody  in  general. 

"Is  he  just  living  there  alone,  with  that  good- 
for-nothing  stepfather?  How  do  they  get 
enough  to  eat?"  said  Cousin  Ann,  looking 
troubled. 

Apparently  Betsy's  question  had  brought 
something  half  forgotten  and  altogether  neg- 
lected into  their  minds.    They  talked  for  some 


170  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

time  after  that  about  'Lias,  the  teacher  confirm- 
ing what  Betsy  and  Stashie  had  said. 

"And  we  sitting  right  here  with  plenty  to 
eat  and  never  raising  a  hand ! ' '  cried  Aunt  Abi- 
gail. 

"How  you  vAll  let  things  slip  out  of  your 
mind!"  said  Cousin  Ann  remorsefully. 

It  struck  Betsy  vividly  that  'Lias  was  not 
at  all  the  one  they  blamed  for  his  objectionable 
appearance.  She  felt  quite  ashamed  to  go  on 
with  the  other  things  she  and  the  little  girls 
had  said,  and  fell  silent,  pretending  to  be  very 
much  absorbed  in  her  game  of  checkers. 

"Do  you  know,"  said  Aunt  Abigail  sud- 
denly, as  though  an  inspiration  had  just  struck 
her,  "I  wouldn't  be  a  bit  surprised  if  that  El- 
more Pond  might  adopt  'Lias  if  he  was  gone  at 
the  right  way." 

"Who's  Elmore  Pond?"  asked  the  school- 
teacher. 

"Why,  you  must  have  seen  him— that  great, 
big,  red-faced,  good-natured-looking  man  that 
comes  through  here  twice  a  year,  buying  stock. 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  171 

He  lives  over  Digby  way,  but  his  wife  was  a 
Hillsboro  girl,  Matey  Pelham — an  awfully  nice 
girl  she  was,  too.  They  never  had  any  children, 
and  Matey  told  me  the  last  time  she  was  back 
for  a  visit  that  she  and  her  husband  talked  quite 
often  about  adopting  a  little  boy.  Seems  that 
Mr.  Pond  has  always  wanted  a  little  boy.  He's 
such  a  nice  man !  'Twould  be  a  lovely  home  for 
a  child." 

i  l  But  goodness ! ' '  said  the  teacher.  ' '  Nobody 
would  want  to  adopt  such  an  awful-looking  lit- 
tle ragamuffin  as  that  'Lias.  He  looks  so 
meeching,  too.  I  guess  his  stepfather  is  real 
mean  to  him,  when  he's  been  drinking,  and  it's 
got  'Lias  so  he  hardly  dares  hold  his  head  up." 

The  clock  struck  loudly.  '  <  Well,  hear  that ! ' ' 
said  Cousin  Ann.  "Nine  o'clock  and  the  chil- 
'  dren  not  in  bed!  Molly's  most  asleep  this 
minute.  Trot  along  with  you,  Betsy!  Trot 
along,  Molly.  And,  Betsy,  be  sure  Molly's  night- 
gown is  buttoned  up  all  the  way." 

So  it  happened  that,  although  the  grown-ups 
were  evidently  going  on  to  talk  about   'Lias 


172  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Brewster,  Betsy  heard  no  more  of  what  they 
said. 

She  herself  went  on  thinking  about  'Lias 
while  she  was  undressing  and  answering  ab- 
sently little  Molly's  chatter.  She  was  thinking 
about  him  even  after  they  had  gone  to  bed, 
had  put  the  light  out,  and  were  lying  snuggled 
up  to  each  other,  back  to  front,  their  four  legs, 
crooked  at  the  same  angle,  fitting  in  together 
neatly  like  two  spoons  in  a  drawer.  She  was 
thinking  about  him  when  she  woke  up,  and  as 
soon  as  she  could  get  hold  of  Cousin  Ann  she 
poured  out  a  new  plan.  She  had  never  been 
afraid  of  Cousin  Ann  since  the  evening  Molly 
had  fallen  into  the  Wolf  Pit  and  Betsy  had  seen 
that  pleased  smile  on  Cousin  Ann's  firm  lips. 
"Cousin  Ann,  couldn't  we  girls  at  school  get 
together  and  sew — you'd  have  to  help  us  some — 
and  make  some  nice,  new  clothes  for  little  'Lias 
Brewster,  and  fix  him  up  so  he'll  look  better,  and 
maybe  that  Mr.  Pond  will  like  him  and  adopt 
him?" 

Cousin  Ann  listened  attentively  and  nodded 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  173 

her  head.  "Yes,  I  think  that  would  be  a  good 
idea,"  she  said.  "We  were  thinking  last  night 
we  ought  to  do  something  for  him.  If  you'll 
make  the  clothes,  Mother '11  knit  him  some  stock- 
ings and  Father  will  get  him  some  shoes.  Mr. 
Pond  never  makes  his  spring  trip  till  late  May, 
so  we'll  have  plenty  of  time." 

Betsy  was  full  of  importance  that  day  at 
school  and  at  recess  time  got  the  girls  together 
on  the  rocks  and  told  them  all  about  the  plan. 
"Cousin  Ann  says  she'll  help  us,  and  we  can 
meet  at  our  house  every  Saturday  afternoon  till 
we  get  them  done.  It'll  be  fun!  Aunt  Abigail 
telephoned  down  to  the  store  right  away,  and 
Mr.  Wilkins  says  he'll  give  the  cloth  if  we'll 
make  it  up." 

Betsy  spoke  very  grandly  of  "making  it  up," 
although  she  had  hardly  held  a  needle  in  her 
life,  and  when  the  Saturday  afternoon  meet- 
ings began  she  was  ashamed  to  see  how  much 
better  Ellen  and  even  Eliza  could  sew  than  she. 
To  keep  her  end  up,  she  was  driven  to  practis- 
ing her  stitches  around  the  lamp  in  the  eve- 


174  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

nings,  with  Aunt  Abigail  'keeping  an  eye  on 
her. 

Cousin  Ann  supervised  the  sewing  on  Satur- 
day afternoons  and  taught  those  of  the  little 
girls  whose  legs  were  long  enough  how  to  use 
the  sewing  machine.  First  they  made  a  little 
pair  of  trousers  out  of  an  old  gray  woolen  skirt 
of  Aunt  Abigail's.  This  was  for  practice,  be- 
fore they  cut  into  the  piece  of  new  blue  serge 
that  the  storekeeper  had  sent  up.  Cousin  Ann 
showed  them  how  to  pin  the  pattern  on  the 
goods  and  they  each  cut  out  one  piece.  Those 
flat,  queer-shaped  pieces  of  cloth  certainly  did 
look  less  like  a  pair  of  trousers  to  Betsy  than 
anything  she  had  ever  seen.  Then  one  of  the 
girls  read  aloud  very  slowly  the  mysterious- 
sounding  directions  from  the  wrapper  of  the 
pattern  about  how  to  put  the  pieces  together. 
Cousin  Ann  helped  here  a  little,  particularly 
just  as  they  were  about  to  put  the  sections  to- 
gether wrong-side-up.  Stashie,  as  the  oldest, 
did  the  first  basting,  putting  the  notches  to- 
gether carefully,  just  as  they  read  the  instruc- 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  175 

tions  aloud,  and  there,  all  of  a  sudden,  was  a 
rough  little  sketch  of  a  pair  of  knee  trousers, 
without  any  hem  or  any  waist-band,  of  course, 
but  just  the  two-legged,  complicated  shape  they 
ought  to  be!  It  was  like  a  miracle  to  Betsy! 
Then  Cousin  Ann  helped  them  sew  the  seams 
on  the  machine,  and  they  all  turned  to  for  the 
basting  of  the  facings  and  the  finishing.  They 
each  made  one  buttonhole.  It  was  the  first  one 
Betsy  had  ever  made,  and  when  she  got  through 
she  was  as  tired  as  though  she  had  run  all  the 
way  to  school  and  back.  Tired,  but  very  proud ; 
although  when  Cousin  Ann  inspected  that  but- 
tonhole, she  covered  her  face  with  her  handker- 
chief for  a  minute,  as  though  she  were  going  to 
sneeze,  although  she  didn't  sneeze  at  all. 

It  took  them  two  Saturdays  to  finish  up  that 
trial  pair  of  trousers,  and  when  they  showed 
the  result  to  Aunt  Abigail  she  was  delighted. 
"Well,  to  think  of  that  being  my  old  skirt!" 
she  said,  putting  on  her  spectacles  to  examine 
the  work.  She  did  not  laugh,  either,  when  she 
saw  those  buttonholes,  but  she  got  up  hastily 


176  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

and  went  into  the  next  room,  where  they  soon 
heard  her  coughing. 

Then  they  made  a  little  blouse  out  of  some 
new  blue  gingham.  Cousin  Ann  happened  to 
have  enough  left  over  from  a  dress  she  was 
making.  This  thin  material  was  ever  so  much 
easier  to  manage  than  the  gray  flannel,  and  they 
had  the  little  garment  done  in  no  time,  even  to 
the  buttons  and  buttonholes.  When  it  came  to 
making  the  buttonholes,  Cousin  Ann  sat  right 
down  with  each  one  and  supervised  every  stitch. 
You  may  not  be  surprised  to  know  that  they 
were  a  great  improvement  over  the  first  batch. 

Then,  making  a  great  ceremony  of  it,  they 
began  on  the  store  material,  working  twice  a 
week  now,  because  May  was  slipping  along  very 
fast,  and  Mr.  Pond  might  be  there  at  any  time. 
They  knew  pretty  well  how  to  go  ahead  on  this 
one,  after  the  experience  of  their  first  pair,  and 
Cousin  Ann  was  not  much  needed,  except  as  ad- 
viser in  hard  places.  She  sat  there  in  the  room 
with  them,  doing  some  sewing  of  her  own,  so 
quiet  that  half  the  time  they  forgot  she  was 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  177 

there.  It  was  great  fun,  sewing  all  together 
and  chattering  as  they  sewed. 

A  good  deal  of  the  time  they  talked  about 
how  splendid  it  was  of  them  to  be  so  kind  to 
little  'Lias.  "My!  I  don't  believe  most  girls 
would  put  themselves  out  this  way  for  a  dirty 
little  boy!"  said  Stashie,  complacently. 

"No  indeed!"  chimed  in  Betsy.  "It's  just 
like  a  story,  isn't  it? — working  and  sacrificing 
for  the  poor!" 

"I  guess  he'll  thank  us  all  right  for  sure!" 
said  Ellen.  "He'll  never  forget  us  as  long  as 
he  lives,  I  don't  suppose." 

Betsy,  her  imagination  fired  by  this  sugges- 
tion, said,  "I  guess  when  he's  grown  up  he'll 
be  telling  everybody  about  how,  when  he  was  so 
poor  and  ragged,  Stashie  Monahan  and  Ellen 
Peters  and  Elizabeth  Ann  ..." 

"And  Eliza!"  put  in  that  little  girl  hastily, 
very  much  afraid  she  would  not  be  given  her 
due  share  of  the  glory. 

Cousin  Ann  sewed,  and  listened,  and  said 
nothing. 


178  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Toward  the  end  of  May  two  little  blouses, 
two  pairs  of  trousers,  two  pairs  of  stockings, 
two  sets  of  underwear  (contributed  by  the 
teacher),  and  the  pair  of  shoes  Uncle  Henry 
gave  were  ready.  The  little  girls  handled  the 
pile  of  new  garments  with  inexpressible  pride, 
and  debated  just  which  way  of  bestowing  them 
was  sufficiently  grand  to  be  worthy  the  occa- 
sion. Betsy  was  for  taking  them  to  school  and 
giving  them  to  'Lias  one  by  one,  so  that  each 
child  could  have  her  thanks  separately.  But 
Stashie  wanted  to  take  them  to  the  house  when 
'Lias's  stepfather  would  be  there,  and  shame 
him  by  showing  that  little  girls  had  had  to  do 
what  he  ought  to  have  done. 

Cousin  Ann  broke  into  the  discussion  by  ask- 
ing, in  her  quiet,  firm  voice,  "Why  do  you  want 
'Lias  to  know  where  the  clothes  come  from?" 

They  had  forgotten  again  that  she  was  there, 
and  turned  around  quickly  to  stare  at  her.  No- 
body could  think  of  any  answer  to  her  very 
queer  question.  It  had  not  occurred  to  any  one 
that  there  could  be  such  a  question. 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  179 

Cousin  Ann  shifted  her  ground  and  asked 
another:  "Why  did  you  make  these  clothes, 
anyhow?" 

They  stared  again,  speechless.  Why  did  she 
ask  that?    She  knew  why. 

Finally  little  Molly  said,  in  her  honest,  baby 
way,  "Why,  you  know  why,  Miss  Ann !  So  'Lias 
Brewster  will  look  nice,  and  Mr.  Pond  will 
maybe  adopt  him." 

"Well,"  said  Cousin  Ann,  "what  has  that 
got  to  do  with  'Lias  knowing  who  did  it?" 

"Why,  he  wouldn't  know  who  to  be  grate- 
ful to,"  cried  Betsy. 

"Oh,"  said  Cousin  Ann.  "Oh,  I  see.  You 
didn't  do  it  to  help  'Lias.  You  did  it  to  have 
him  grateful  to  you.  I  see.  Molly  is  such  a 
little  girl,  it's  no  wonder  she  didn't  really  take 
in  what  you  girls  were  up  to."  She  nodded 
her  head  wisely,  as  though  now  she  under- 
stood. 

But  if  she  did,  little  Molly  certainly  did  not. 
She  had  not  the  least  idea  what  everybody  was 
talking   about.     She   looked  from   one    sober, 


180  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

downcast  face  to  another  rather  anxiously. 
What  was  the  matter? 

Apparently  nothing  was  really  the  matter, 
she  decided,  for  after  a  minute's  silence  Miss 
Ann  got  up  with  entirely  her  usual  face  of 
cheerful  gravity,  and  said:  " Don't  you  think 
you  little  girls  ought  to  top  off  this  last  after- 
noon with  a  tea-party?  There's  a  new  batch  of 
cookies,  and  you  can  make  yourselves  some 
lemonade  if  you  want  to." 

They  had  these  refreshments  out  on  the 
porch,  in  the  sunshine,  with  their  dolls  for 
guests  and  a  great  deal  of  chatter  for  sauce. 
Nobody  said  another  word  about  how  to  give 
the  clothes  to  'Lias,  till,  just  as  the  girls  were 
going  away,  Betsy  said,  walking  along  with  the 
two  older  ones,  "Say,  don't  you  think  it'd  be 
fun  to  go  some  evening  after  dark  and  leave 
the  clothes  on  'Lias's  doorstep,  and  knock  and 
run  away  quick  before  anybody  comes  to  the 
door?"  She  spoke  in  an  uncertain  voice  and 
smoothed  Deborah's  carved  wooden  curls.  • 

"Yes,  I  do!"  said  Ellen,  not  looking  at  Betsy 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  181 

but  down  at  the  weeds  by  the  road.    "I  think  it 

would  be  lots  of  fun ! ' ' 

Little  Molly,  playing  with  Annie  and  Eliza, 

did  not  hear  this ;  but  she  was  allowed  to  go  with 

the  older  girls  on  the  great  expedition. 
I 

It  was  a  warm,  dark  evening  in  late  May,  with 
the  frogs  piping  their  sweet,  high  note,  and 
the  first  of  the  fireflies  wheeling  over  the  wet 
meadows  near  the  tumble-down  house  where 
'Lias  lived.  The  girls  took  turns  in  carrying 
the  big  paper-wrapped  bundle,  and  stole  along 
in  the  shadow  of  the  trees,  full  of  excitement, 
looking  over  their  shoulders  at  nothing  and 
pressing  their  hands  over  their  mouths  to  keep 
back  the  giggles.  There  was,  of  course,  no  rea- 
son on  earth  why  they  should  giggle,  which  is, 
of  course,  the  very  reason  why  they  did.  If 
you've  ever  been  a  little  girl  you  know  about 
that. 

One  window  of  the  small  house  was  dimly 
lighted,  they  found,  when  they  came  in  sight  of 
it,  and  they  thrilled  with  excitement  and  joyful 


182  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

alarm.  Suppose  'Lias's  dreadful  stepfather 
should  -come  out  and  yell  at  them !  They  came 
forward  on  tiptoe,  making  a  great  deal  of  noise 
by  stepping  on  twigs,  rustling  bushes,  crackling 
gravel  under  their  feet  and  doing  all  the  other 
things  that  make  such  a  noise  at  night  and 
never  do  in  the  daytime.  But  nobody  stirred 
inside  the  room  with  /the  lighted  window.  They 
crept  forward  and  peeped  cautiously  inside 
.  .  .  and  stopped  giggling.  The  dim  light  com- 
ing from  a  little  kerosene  lamp  with  a  smoky 
chimney  fell  on  a  dismal,  cluttered  room,  a  bare, 
greasy  wooden  table,  and  two  broken-backed 
chairs,  with  little  'Lias  in  one  of  them.  He  had 
fallen  asleep  with  his  head  on  his  arms,  his 
pinched,  dirty,  sad  little  figure  showing  in  the 
light  from  the  lamp.  His  feet  dangled  high 
above  the  floor  in  their  broken,  muddy  shoes. 
One  sleeve  was  torn  to  the  shoulder.  A  piece  of 
dry  bread  had  slipped  from  his  bony  little  hand 
and  a  tin  dipper  stood  beside  him  on  the  bare 
table.  Nobody  else  was  in  the  room,  nor  evi- 
dently in  the  darkened,  empty,  tireless  house. 


He  had  fallen  asleep  with  his  head  on  his  arms. 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  183 

As  long  as  she  lives  Betsy  will  never  forget 
what  she  saw  that  night  through  that 
window.  Her  eyes  grew  very  hot  and  her  hands 
very  cold.  Her  heart  thumped  hard.  She 
reached  for  little  Molly  and  gave  her  a  great 
hug  in  the  darkness.  Suppose  it  were  little 
Molly  asleep  there,  all  alone  in  the  dirty,  dismal 
house,  with  no  supper  and  nobody  to  put  her 
to  bed.  She  found  that  Ellen,  next  her,  was 
crying  quietly  into  the  corner  of  her  apron. 

Nobody  said  a  word.  Stashie,  who  had  the 
bundle,  walked  around  soberly  to  the  front 
door,  put  it  down,  and  knocked  loudly.  They 
all  darted  away  noiselessly  to  the  road,  to  the 
shadow  of  the  trees,  and  waited  until  the  door 
opened.  A  square  of  yellow  light  appeared, 
with  'Lias 's  figure,  very  small,  at  the  bottom  of 
it.  They  saw  him  stoop  and  pick  up  the  bun- 
dle and  go  back  into  the  house.  Then  they 
went  quickly  and  silently  back,  separating  at 
the  cross-roads  with  no  good-night  greetings. 

Molly  and  Betsy  began  to  climb  the  hill  to 
Putney  Farm.    It  was  a  very  warm  night  for 


184  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

May,  and  little  Molly  began  to  puff  for  breath. 
"Let's  sit  down  on  this  rock  awhile  and  rest," 
she  said. 

They  were  half-way  up  the  hill  now.  From 
the  rock  they  could  see  the  lights  in  the  farm- 
houses scattered  along  the  valley  road  and  on 
the  side  of  the  mountain  opposite  them,  like  big 
stars  fallen  from  the  multitude  above.  Betsy 
lay  down  on  the  rock  and  looked  up  at  the  stars. 
After  a  silence  little  Molly's  chirping  voice  said, 
"Oh,  I  thought  you  said  we  were  going  to  march 
up  to  'Lias  in  school  and  give  him  his  clothes. 
Did  you  forget  about  that?" 

Betsy  gave  a  wriggle  of  shame  as  she  remem- 
bered that  plan.  "No,  we  didn't  forget  it,"  she 
said.  "We  thought  this  would  be  a  better 
way. ' ' 

"But  how '11  'Lias  know  who  to  thank?"  asked 
Molly. 

"That's  no  matter,"  said  Betsy.  Yes,  it  was 
Elizabeth-Ann-that-was  who  said  that.  And 
meant  it,  too.  She  was  not  even  thinking  of 
what  she  was  saying.     Between  her  and  the 


A  SEWING  SOCIETY  185 

stars,  thick  over  her  in  the  black,  soft  sky,  she 
saw  again  that  dirty,  disordered  room  and  the 
little  boy,  all  alone,  asleep  with  a  piece  of  dry 
bread  in  his  bony  little  fingers. 

She  looked  hard  and  long  at  that  picture,  all 
the  time  seeing  the  quiet  stars  through  it.  And 
then  she  turned  over  and  hid  her  face  on  the 
rock.  She  had  said  her  "Now  I  lay  me"  every 
night  since  she  could  remember,  but  she  had 
never  prayed  till  she  lay  there  with  her  face 
on  the  rock,  saying  over  and  over,  "Oh,  God, 
please,  please,  please  make  Mr.  Pond  adopt 
'Lias." 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL 

All  the  little  girls  went  early  to  school  the 
next  day,  eager  for  the  first  glimpse  of  'Lias  in 
his  new  clothes.  They  now  quite  enjoyed  the 
mystery  about  who  had  made  them,  and  were 
full  of  agreeable  excitement  as  the  little  figure 
was  seen  approaching  down  the  road.  He  wore 
the  gray  trousers  and  the  little  blue  shirt;  the 
trousers  were  a  little  too  long,  the  shirt  a  per- 
fect fit.  The  girls  gazed  at  him  with  pride  as 
he  came  on  the  playground,  walking  briskly 
along  in  the  new  shoes,  which  were  just  the 
right  size.  He  had  been  wearing  all  winter  a 
pair  of  cast-off  women's  shoes. 

From  a  distance  he  looked  like  another  child. 
But  as  he  came  closer  .  .  .oh!  his  face!  his 
hair!  his  hands!  his  finger-nails!     The  little 

186 


THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL  187 

fellow  had  evidently  tried  to  live  up  to  his 
beautiful  new  raiment,  for  his  hair  had  been 
roughly  put  back  from  his  face,  and  around  his 
mouth  and  nose  was  a  small  area  of  almost  clean 
skin,  where  he  had  made  an  attempt  at  washing 
his  face.  But  he  had  made  practically  no  im- 
pression on  the  layers  of  encrusted  dirt,  and 
the  little  girls  looked  at  him  ruefully.  Mr. 
Pond  would  certainly  never  take  a  fancy  to 
such  a  dreadfully  grimy  child !  His  new,  clean 
clothes  made  him  look  all  the  worse,  as  though 
dirty  on  purpose! 

The  little  girls  retired  to  their  rock-pile  and 
talked  over  their  bitter  disappointment,  Ralph 
and  the  other  boys  absorbed  in  a  game  of  mar- 
bles near  them.  'Lias  had  gone  proudly  into 
the  schoolroom  to  show  himself  to  Miss  Benton. 

It  was  the  day  before  Decoration  Day  and  a 
good  deal  of  time  was  taken  up  with  practising 
on  the  recitations  they  were  going  to  give  at  the 
Decoration  Day  exercises  in  the  village.  Sev- 
eral of  the  children  from  each  school  in  the 
township  were  to  speak  pieces  in  the  Town  Hall. 


188  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Betsy  was  to  recite  Barbara  Frietchie,  her  first 
love  in  that  school,  but  she  droned  it  over  with 
none  of  her  usual  pleasure,  her  eyes  on  little 
'Lias's  smiling-  face,  so  unconscious  of  its 
dinginess. 

At  noon  time  the  boys  disappeared  down 
toward  the  swimming-hole.  They  often  took  a 
swim  at  noon  and  nobody  thought  anything 
about  it  on  that  day.  The  little  girls  ate  their 
lunch  on  their  rock,  mourning  over  the  failure  of 
their  plans,  and  scheming  ways  to  meet  the  new 
obstacle.  Stashie  suggested,  "Couldn't  your 
Aunt  Abigail  invite  him  up  to  your  house  for 
supper  and  then  give  him  a  bath  afterward?" 
But  Betsy,  although  she  had  never  heard  of 
treating  a  supper-guest  in  this  way,  was  sure 
that  it  was  not  possible.  She  shook  her  head 
sadly,  her  eyes  on  the  far-off  gleam  of  white 
where  the  boys  jumped  up  and  down  in  their 
swimming-hole.  That  was  not  a  good  name  for 
it,  because  there  was  only  one  part  of  it  deep 
enough  to  swim  in.  Mostly  it  was  a  shallow  bay 
in  an  arm  of  the  river,  where  the  water  was 


THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL  189 

only  up  to  a  little  boy's  knees  and  where  there 
was  almost  no  current.  The  sun  beating  down 
on  it  made  it  quite  warm,  and  even  the  first- 
graders  '  mothers  allowed  them  to  go  in.  They 
only  jumped  up  and  down  and  squealed  and 
splashed  each  other,  but  they  enjoyed  that  quite 
as  much  as  Frank  and  Harry,  the  two  seventh- 
graders,  enjoyed  their  swooping  dives  from  the 
spring-board  over  the  pool.  They  were  late  in 
getting  back  from  the  river  that  day  and  Miss 
Benton  had  to  ring  her  bell  hard  in  that  direc- 
tion before  they  came  trooping  up  and  clattered 
into  the  schoolroom,  where  the  girls  already 
sat,  their  eyes  lowered  virtuously  to  their  books, 
with  a  prim  air  of  self-righteousness.  They 
were  never  late ! 

Betsy  was  reciting  her  arithmetic.  She  was 
getting  on  famously  with  that.  Weeks  ago,  as 
soon  as  Miss  Benton  had  seen  the  confusion  of 
the  little  girl's  mind,  the  two  had  settled  down 
to  a  serious  struggle  with  that  subject.  Miss 
Benton  had  had  Betsy  recite  all  by  herself,  so 
she  wouldn't  be  flurried  by  the  others;  and  to 


190  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

begin  with  had  gone  back,  back,  back  to  bed- 
rock, to  things  Betsy  absolutely  knew,  to  the 
2x2's  and  the  3x3's.  And  then,  very  cau- 
tiously, a  step  at  a  time,  they  had  advanced, 
stopping  short  whenever  Betsy  felt  a  beginning 
of  that  bewildered  "guessing"  impulse  which 
made  her  answer  wildly  at  random. 

After  a  while,  in  the  dark  night  which  arith- 
metic had  always  been  to  her,  Betsy  began  to 
make  out  a  few  definite  outlines,  which  were 
always  there,  facts  which  she  knew  to  be  so  with- 
out guessing  from  the  expression  of  her  teach- 
er's face.  From  that  moment  her  progress 
had  been  rapid,  one  sure  fact  hooking  itself 
on  to  another,  and  another  one  on  to  that.  She 
attacked  a  page  of  problems  now  with  a  zest 
and  self-confidence  which  made  her  arithmetic 
lessons  among  the  most  interesting  hours  at 
school.  On  that  day  she  was  standing  up  at 
the  board,  a  piece  of  chalk  in  her  hand,  chew- 
ing her  tongue  and  thinking  hard  how  to  find 
out  the  amount  of  wall-paper  needed  for  a 
room  12  feet  square  with  two  doors  and  two 


THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL  191 

windows  in  it,  when  her  eye  fell  on  little 
'Lias,  bent  over  his  reading  book.  She  for- 
got her  arithmetic,  she  forgot  where  she 
was.  She  stared  and  stared,  till  Ellen,  catch- 
ing the  direction  of  her  eyes,  looked  and 
stared  too.  Little  'Lias  was  clean,  preter- 
naturally,  almost  wetly  clean.  His  face  was 
clean  and  shining,  his  ears  shone  pink  and  fair, 
his  hands  were  absolutely  spotless,  even  his 
hay-colored  hair  was  clean  and,  still  damp, 
brushed  flatly  back  till  it  shone  in  the  sun. 
Betsy  blinked  her  eyes  a  great  many  times, 
thinking  she  must  be  dreaming,  but  every  time 
she  opened  them  there  was  'Lias,  looking  white 
and  polished  like  a  new  willow  whistle. 

Somebody  poked  her  hard  in  the  ribs.  She 
started  and,  turning,  saw  Ealph,  who  was  doing 
a  sum  beside  her  on  the  board,  scowling  at  her 
under  his  black  brows.  "Quit  gawking  at 
'Lias,"  he  said  under  his  breath.  "You  make 
me  tired!"  Something  conscious  and  shame- 
faced in  his  manner  made  Betsy  understand  at 
once  what  had  happened.     Ralph  had  taken 


192  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

'Lias  down  to  the  little  boys '  wading-place  and 
had  washed  him  all  over.  She  remembered 
now  that  they  had  a  piece  of  yellow  soap  there. 

Her  face  broke  into  a  radiant  smile  and  she 
began  to  say  something  to  Ralph  about  how 
nice  that  was  of  him,  but  he  frowned  again  and 
said,  crossly,  "Aw,  cut  it  out!  Look  at  what 
you've  done  there!  If  I  couldn't  9x8  and  get 
it  right!" 

"How  queer  boys  are!"  thought  Betsy,  eras- 
ing her  mistake  and  putting  down  the  right 
answer.  But  she  did  not  try  to  speak  to  Ralph 
again  about  'Lias,  not  even  after  school,  when 
she  saw  'Lias  going  home  with  a  new  cap  on 
his  head  which  she  recognized  as  Ralph's.  She 
just  looked  at  Ralph's  bare  head,  and  smiled 
her  eyes  at  him,  keeping  the  rest  of  her  face 
sober,  the  way  Cousin  Ann  did.  For  just  a 
minute  Ralph  almost  smiled  back.  At  least  he 
looked  quite  friendly.  They  stepped  along 
toward  home  together,  the  first  time  Ralph  had 
ever  condescended  to  walk  beside  a  girl. 

"We  got  a  new  colt,"  he  said. 


THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL  193 

* '  Have  you  I ' '  she  said.    ' '  What  color  ? ' ' 

"Black,  with  a  white  star,  and  they're  going 
to  let  me  ride  him  when  he 's  old  enough. ' ' 

"  My !    Won 't  that  be  nice ! "  said  Betsy. 

And  all  the  time  they  were  both  thinking  of 
little  'Lias  with  his  new  clothes  and  his  sweet, 
thin  face  shining  with  cleanliness. 

"Do  you  like  spruce  gum?"  asked  Ralph. 

"Oh,  I  love  gum!"  said  Betsy. 

"Well,  I'll  bring  you  down  a  chunk  tomor- 
row, if  I  don't  forget  it,"  said  Ralph,  turning 
off  at  the  cross-roads. 

They  had  not  mentioned  'Lias  at  all. 

The  next  day  they  were  to  have  school  only 
in  the  morning.  In  the  afternoon  they  were  to 
go  in  a  big  hay-wagon  down  to  the  village  to 
the  "exercises."  'Lias  came  to  school  in  his 
new  blue-serge  trousers  and  his  white  blouse. 
The  little  girls  gloated  over  his  appearance, 
and  hung  around  him,  for  who  was  to  "visit 
school"  that  morning  but  Mr.  Pond  himself! 
Cousin  Ann  had  arranged  it  somehow.  It 
took  Cousin  Ann  to  fix  things !    During  recess, 


194  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

as  they  were  playing  still-pond-no-more-mov- 
ing on  the  playground,  Mr.  Pond  and  Uncle 
Henry  drew  up  to  the  edge  of  the  playground, 
stopped  their  horse,  and,  talking  and  laugh- 
ing together,  watched  the  children  at  play. 
Betsy  looked  hard  at  the  big,  burly,  kind-faced 
man  with  the  smiling  eyes  and  the  hearty  laugh, 
and  decided  that  he  would  "do"  perfectly  for 
'Lias.  But  what  she  decided  was  to  have  little 
importance,  apparently,  for  after  all  he  would 
not  get  out  of  the  wagon,  but  said  he'd  have 
to  drive  right  on  to  the  village.  Just  like  that, 
with  no  excuse  other  than  a  careless  glance  at 
his  watch.  No,  he  guessed  he  wouldn't  have 
time,  this  morning,  he  said.  Betsy  cast  an  im- 
ploring look  up  into  Uncle  Henry's  face,  but 
evidently  he  felt  himself  quite  helpless,  too.  Oh, 
if  only  Cousin  Ann  had  come !  She  would  have 
marched  him  into  the  schoolhouse  double-quick. 
But  Uncle  Henry  was  not  Cousin  Ann,  and 
though  Betsy  saw  him,  as  they  drove  away, 
conscientiously  point  out  little  'Lias,  resplend- 
ent and  shining,  Mr.  Pond  only  nodded  absently, 


THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL  195 

as  though  he  were  thinking  of  something 
else. 

Betsy  could  have  cried  with  disappointment ; 
but  she  and  the  other  girls,  putting  their  heads 
together  for  comfort,  told  each  other  that  there 
was  time  enough  yet.  Mr.  Pond  would  not 
leave  town  till  tomorrow.  Perhaps  .  .  .  there 
was  still  some  hope. 

But  that  afternoon  even  this  last  hope  was 
dashed.  As  they  gathered  at  the  schoolhouse, 
the  girls  fresh  and  crisp  in  their  newly  starched 
dresses,  with  red  or  blue  hair-ribbons,  the  boys 
very  self-conscious  in  their  dark  suits,  clean 
collars,  new  caps  (all  but  Ralph),  and  blacked 
shoes,  there  was  no  little  'Lias.  They  waited 
and  waited,  but  there  was  no  sign  of  him.  Fi- 
nally Uncle  Henry,  who  was  to  drive  the  straw- 
ride  down  to  town,  looked  at  his  watch,  gath- 
ered up  the  reins,  and  said  they  would  be  late 
if  they  didn't  start  right  away.  Maybe  'Lias 
had  had  a  chance  to  ride  in  with  somebody  else. 

They  all  piled  in,  the  horses  stepped  off, 
the  wheels  grated  on  the  stones.    And  just  at 


196  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

that  moment  a  dismal  sound  of  sobbing  wails 
reached  them  from  the  woodshed  back  of  the 
schoolhouse.  The  children  tumbled  out  as  fast 
as  they  had  tumbled  in,  and  ran  back,  Betsy 
and  Ralph  at  their  head.  There  in  the  wood- 
shed was  little  'Lias,  huddled  in  the  corner 
behind  some  wood,  crying  and  crying  and  cry- 
ing, digging  his  fists  into  his  eyes,  his  face  all 
smeared  with  tears  and  dirt.  And  he  was 
dressed  again  in  his  filthy,  torn  old  overalls  and 
ragged  shirt.  His  poor  little  bare  feet  shone 
with  a  piteous  cleanliness  in  that  dark  place. 

"What's  the  matter?  What's  the  matter?" 
the  children  asked  him  all  at  once.  He  flung 
himself  on  Ralph,  burying  his  face  in  the  other 
boy's  coat,  and  sobbed  out  some  disjointed 
story  which  only  Ralph  could  hear  .  .  .  and 
then  as  last  and  final  climax  of  the  disaster,  who 
should  come  looking  over  the  shoulders  of  the 
children  but  Uncle  Henry  and  Mr.  Pond!  And 
'Lias  all  ragged  and  dirty  again!  Betsy  sat 
down  weakly  on  a  pile  of  wood,  utterly  dis- 
heartened.   What  was  the  use  of  anything! 


THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL  197 

"What's  the  matter?"  asked  the  two  men  to- 
gether. 

Ralph  turned,  with  an  angry  toss  of  his  dark 
head,  and  told  them  bitterly,  over  the  heads  of 
the  children:  "He  just  had  some  decent  clothes. 
.  .  .  First  ones  he's  ever  had!  And  he  was 
lotting  on  going  to  the  exercises  in  the  Town 
Hall.  And  that  darned  old  skunk  of  a  step- 
father has  gone  and  taken  'em  and  sold  'em  to 
get  whiskey.    I'd  like  to  kill  him!" 

Betsy  could  have  flung  her  arms  around  Ralph, 
he  looked  so  exactly  the  way  she  felt.  "Yes, 
he  is  a  darned  old  skunk!"  she  said  to  herself, 
rejoicing  in  the  bad  words  she  did  not  know  be- 
fore. It  took  bad  words  to  qualify  what  had 
happened. 

She  saw  an  electric  spark  pass  from  Ralph's 
blazing  eyes  to  Mr.  Pond's  broad  face,  now 
grim  and  fierce.  She  saw  Mr.  Pond  step  for- 
ward, brushing  the  children  out  of  his  way, 
like  a  giant  among  dwarfs.  She  saw  him  stoop 
and  pick  little  'Lias  up  in  his  great,  strong 
arms,  and,  holding  him  close,  stride  furiously 


198  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

out  of  the  woodshed,  across  the  playground  to 
the  buggy  which  was  waiting  for  him. 

"He'll  go  to  the  exercises  all  right!"  he 
called  back  over  his  shoulder  in  a  great  roar. 
"He'll  go,  if  I  have  to  buy  out  the  whole  town 
to  get  him  an  outfit !  And  that  whelp  won't  get 
these  clothes,  either;  you  hear  me  say  so!" 

He  sprang  into  the  buggy  and,  holding  'Lias 
on  his  lap,  took  up  the  reins  and  drove  rapidly 
forward. 

They  saw  little  'Lias  again,  entering  the 
Town  Hall,  holding  fast  to  Mr.  Pond's  hand. 
He  was  magnificent  in  a  whole  suit  of  store 
clothes,  coat  and  all,  and  he  wore  white  stock- 
ings and  neat,  low  shoes,  like  a  city  child ! 

They  saw  him  later,  up  on  the  platform, 
squeaking  out  his  little  patriotic  poem,  his  eyes, 
shining  like  stars,  fixed  on  one  broad,  smiling 
face  in  the  audience.  When  he  finished  he  was 
overcome  with  shyness  by  the  applause,  and  for 
a  moment  forgot  to  turn  and  leave  the  plat- 
form. He  hung  his  head,  and,  looking  out 
from  under  his  eyebrows,  gave  a  quaint,  shy 


THE  NEW  CLOTHES  FAIL  199 

little  smile  at  the  audience.  Betsy  saw  Mr. 
Pond's  great  smile  waver  and  grow  dim.  His 
eyes  filled  so  full  that  he  had  to  take  out  his 
handkerchief  and  blow  his  nose  loudly. 

And  they  saw  little  'Lias  once  more,  for  the 
last  time.  Mr.  Pond's  buggy  drove  rapidly  past 
their  slow-moving  hay- wagon,  Mr.  Pond  holding 
the  reins  masterfully  in  one  hand.  Beside  him, 
very  close,  sat  'Lias  with  his  lap  full  of  toys,  oh, 
full — like  Christmas !  In  that  fleeting  glimpse 
they  saw  a  toy  train,  a  stuffed  dog,  a  candy- 
box,  a  pile  of  picture-books,  tops,  paper-bags, 
and  even  the  swinging  crane  of  the  big  mechan- 
ical toy  dredge  that  everybody  said  the  store- 
keeper could  never  sell  to  anybody  because  it 
cost  so  much! 

As  they  passed  swiftly,  'Lias  looked  out  at 
them  and  waved  his  little  hand  flutteringly.  His 
other  hand  was  tightly  clasped  in  Mr.  Pond's 
big  one.  He  was  smiling  at  them  all.  His  eyes 
looked  dazed  and  radiant.  He  turned  his  head 
as  the  buggy  flashed  by  to  call  out,  in  a  shrill, 
exulting  little   shout,   "Good-bye!     Good-bye! 


200  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

I'm  going  to  live  with  ..."  They  could  hear 
no  more.  He  was  gone,  only  his  little  hand  still 
waving  at  them  over  the  back  of  the  buggy  seat. 

Betsy  drew  a  long,  long  breath.  She  found 
that  Ralph  was  looking  at  her.  For  a  moment 
she  couldn't  think  what  made  him  look  so  dif- 
ferent. Then  she  saw  that  he  was  smiling. 
She  had  never  seen  him  smile  before.  He 
smiled  at  her  as  though  he  were  sure  she  would 
understand,  and  never  said  a  word.  Betsy 
looked  forward  again  and  saw  the  gleaming 
buggy  vanishing  over  the  hill  in  front  of  them. 
She  smiled  back  at  Ralph  silently. 

Not  a  thing  had  happened  the  way  she  had 
planned ;  no,  not  a  single  thing !  But  it  seemed 
to  her  she  had  never  been  so  happy  in  her 
life. 


CHAPTER  X 

BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY 

Betsy's  birthday  was  the  ninth  day  of  Sep- 
tember, and  the  Necronsett  Valley  Fair  is  al- 
ways held  from  the  eighth  to  the  twelfth.  So  it 
was  decided  that  Betsy  should  celebrate  her 
birthday  by  going  np  to  Woodford,  where  the 
Fair  was  held.  The  Putneys  weren't  going  that 
year,  but  the  people  on  the  next  farm,  the 
Wendells,  said  they  could  make  room  in  their 
surrey  for  the  two  little  girls;  for,  of  course, 
Molly  was  going,  too.  In  fact,  she  said  the 
Fair  was  held  partly  to  celebrate  her  being  six 
years  old.  This  would  happen  on  the  seven- 
teenth of  October.  Molly  insisted  that  that  was 
plenty  close  enough  to  the  ninth  of  September 
to  be  celebrated  then.  This  made  Betsy  feel 
like  laughing  out,  but  observing  that  the  Put- 

201 


202  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

neys  only  looked  at  each  other  with  the  faintest 
possible  quirk  in  the  corners  of  their  serious 
mouths,  she  understood  that  they  were  afraid 
that  Molly's  feelings  might  be  hurt  if  they 
laughed  out  loud.  So  Betsy  tried  to  curve  her 
young  lips  to  the  same  kind  and  secret  mirth. 

And,  I  can't  tell  you  why,  this  effort  not  to 
hurt  Molly's  feelings  made  her  have  a  perfect 
spasm  of  love  for  Molly.  She  threw  herself  on 
her  and  gave  her  a  great  hug  that  tipped  them 
both  over  on  the  couch  on  top  of  Shep,  who 
stopped  snoring  with  his  great  gurgling  snort, 
wriggled  out  from  under  them,  and  stood  with 
laughing  eyes  and  wagging  tail,  looking  at  them 
as  they  rolled  and  giggled  among  the  pillows. 

"What  dress  are  you  going  to  wear  to  the 
Fair,  Betsy?"  asked  Cousin  Ann.  "And  we 
must  decide  about  Molly's,  too." 

This  stopped  their  rough-and-tumble  fun  in 
short  order,  and  they  applied  themselves  to  the 
serious  question  of  a  toilet. 

When  the  great  day  arrived  and  the  surrey 
drove  away  from  the  Wendells'  gate,  Betsy  was 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  203 

in  a  fresh  pink-and-white  gingham  which  she 
had  helped  Cousin  Ann  make,  and  plump  Molly 
looked  like  something  good  to  eat  in  a  crisp 
white  little  dimity,  one  of  Betsy's  old  dresses, 
with  a  deep  hem  taken  in  to  make  it  short 
enough  for  the  little  butter-ball.  Because  it 
was  Betsy's  birthday,  she  sat  on  the  front  seat 
with  Mr.  Wendell,  and  part  of  the  time,  when 
there  were  not  too  many  teams  on  the  road,  she 
drove,  herself.  Mrs.  Wendell  and  her  sister 
filled  the  back  seat  solidly  full  from  side  to 
side  and  made  one  continuous  soft  lap  on  which 
Molly  happily  perched,  her  eyes  shining,  her 
round  cheeks  red  with  joyful  excitement.  Betsy 
looked  back  at  her  several  times  and  thought 
how  very  nice  Molly  looked.  She  had,  of  course, 
little  idea  how  she  herself  looked,  because  the 
mirrors  at  Putney  Farm  were  all  small  and 
high  up,  and  anyhow  they  were  so  old  and 
greenish  that  they  made  everybody  look  very 
queer-colored.  You  looked  in  them  to  see  if 
your  hair  was  smooth,  and  that  was  about  all 
you  could  stand. 


204  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

So  it  was  a  great  surprise  to  Betsy  later  in 
the  morning,  as  she  and  Molly  wandered 
hand  in  hand  through  the  wonders  of  Industrial 
Hall,  to  catch  sight  of  Molly  in  a  full-length 
mirror  as  clear  as  water.  She  was  almost 
startled  to  see  how  faithfully  reflected  were  the 
yellow  of  the  little  girl's  curls,  the  clear  pink 
and  white  of  her  face,  and  the  blue  of  her  soft 
eyes.  An  older  girl  was  reflected  there  also, 
near  Molly,  a  dark-eyed,  red-cheeked,  sturdy  lit- 
tle girl,  standing  very  straight  on  two  strong 
legs,  holding  her  head  high  and  free,  her  dark 
eyes  looking  out  brightly  from  her  tanned  face. 
For  an  instant  Betsy  gazed  into  those  clear  eyes 
and  then  .  .  .  why,  gracious  goodness !  That 
was  herself  she  was  looking  at !  How  changed 
she  was !  How  very,  very  different  she  looked 
from  the  last  time  she  had  seen  herself  in  a 
big  mirror !  She  remembered  it  well — out  shop- 
ping with  Aunt  Frances  in  a  department  store, 
she  had  caught  sight  of  a  pale  little  girl,  with 
a  thin  neck,  and  spindling  legs  half-hidden  in 
the  folds  of  Aunt  Frances's  skirts.     But  she 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  205 

didn't  look  even  like  the  sister  of  this  browned, 
muscular,  upstanding  child  who  held  Molly's 
hand  so  firmly. 

All  this  came  into  her  mind  and  went  out 
again  in  a  moment,  for  Molly  caught  sight  of 
a  big  doll  in  the  next  aisle  and  they  hurried 
over  to  inspect  her  clothing.  The  mirror  was 
forgotten  in  the  many  exciting  sights  and 
sounds  and  smells  of  their  first  county 
fair. 

The  two  little  girls  were  to  wander  about  as 
they  pleased  until  noon,  when  they  were  to  meet 
the  Wendells  in  the  shadow  of  Industrial  Hall 
and  eat  their  picnic  lunch  together.  The  two 
parties  arrived  together  from  different  direc- 
tions, having  seen  very  different  sides  of  the 
Fair.  The  children  were  full  of  the  merry-go- 
rounds,  the  balloon-seller,  the  toy-venders,  and 
the  pop-corn  stands,  while  the  Wendells  ex- 
changed views  on  the  shortness  of  a  hog's  legs, 
the  dip  in  a  cow's  back,  and  the  thickness  of  a 
sheep's  wool.  The  Wendells,  it  seemed,  had 
met  some  cousins  they  didn't  expect  to  see, 


206  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

who,  not  knowing  about  Betsy  and  Molly, 
had  hoped  that  they  might  ride  home  with  the 
Wendells. 

" Don't  you  suppose,"  Mrs.  Wendell  asked 
Betsy,  "that  you  and  Molly  could  go  home  with 
the  Vaughans?  They're  here  in  their  big 
wagon.  You  could  sit  on  the  floor  with  the 
Vaughan  children." 

Betsy  and  Molly  thought  this  would  be  great 
fun,  and  agreed  enthusiastically. 

"All  right  then,"  said  Mrs.  Wendell.  She 
called  to  a  young  man  who  stood  inside  the 
building,  near  an  open  window:  "Oh,  Frank, 
Will  Vaughan  is  going  to  be  in  your  booth  this 
afternoon,  isn't  he?" 

"Yes,  ma'am,"  said  the  young  man.  "His 
turn  is  from  two  to  four." 

"Well,  you  tell  him,  will  you,  that  the  two 
little  girls  who  live  at  Putney  Farm  are  going 
to  go  home  with  them.  They  can  sit  on  the  bot- 
tom of  the  wagon  with  the  Vaughan  young 
ones." 

"Yes,  ma'am,"  said  the  young  man,  with  a 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  207 

noticeable  lack  of  interest  in  how  Betsy  and 
Molly  got  home. 

"Now,  Betsy,"  said  Mrs.  Wendell,  "you  go 
round  to  that  booth  at  two  and  ask  Will 
Vaughan  what  time  they're  going  to  start  and 
where  their  wagon  is,  and  then  you  be  sure  not 
to  keep  them  waiting  a  minute." 

"No,  I  won't,"  said  Betsy.  "I'll  be  sure  to 
be  there  on  time." 

She  and  Molly  still  had  twenty  cents  to  spend 
out  of  the  forty  they  had  brought  with  them, 
twenty-five  earned  by  berry-picking  and  fifteen 
a  present  from  Uncle  Henry.  They  now  put 
their  heads  together  to  see  how  they  could 
make  the  best  possible  use  of  their  four  nickels. 
Cousin  Ann  had  put  no  restrictions  whatever 
on  them,  saying  they  could  buy  any  sort  of 
truck  or  rubbish  they  could  find,  except  the 
pink  lemonade.  She  said  she  had  been  told  the 
venders  washed  their  glasses  in  that,  and  their 
hands,  and  for  all  she  knew  their  faces.  Betsy 
was  for  merry-go-rounds,  but  Molly  yearned 
for  a  big  red  balloon ;  and  while  they  were  buy- 


208  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ing  that  a  man  came  by  with  toy  dogs,  little 
brown  dogs  with  curled-wire  tails.  He  called 
out  that  they  would  bark  when  you  pulled  their 
tails,  and  seeing  the  little  girls  looking  at  him 
he  pulled  the  tail  of  the  one  he  held.  It  gave 
forth  a  fine  loud  yelp,  just  like  Shep  when  his 
tail  got  stepped  on.  Betsy  bought  one,  all  done 
up  neatly  in  a  box  tied  with  blue  string.  She 
thought  it  a  great  bargain  to  get  a  dog  who 
would  bark  for  five  cents.  (Later  on,  when  they 
undid  the  string  and  opened  the  box,  they  found 
the  dog  had  one  leg  broken  off  and  wouldn't 
make  the  faintest  squeak  when  his  tail  was 
pulled;  but  that  is  the  sort  of  thing  you  must 
expect  to  have  happen  to  you  at  a  county 
fair.) 

Now  they  had  ten  cents  left  and  they  decided 
to  have  a  ride  apiece  on  the  merry-go-round. 
But,  glancing  up  at  the  clock-face  in  the  tower 
over  Agricultural  Hall,  Betsy  noticed  it  was 
half-past  two  and  she  decided  to  go  first  to  the 
booth  where  Will  Vaughan  was  to  be  and  find 
out  what  time  they  would  start  for  home.    She 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  209 

found  the  booth  with  no  difficulty,  but  William 
Vaughan  was  not  in  it.  Nor  was  the  young 
man  she  had  seen  before.  There  was  a  new 
one,  a  strange  one,  a  careless,  whistling  young- 
man,  with  very  bright  socks,  very  yellow  shoes, 
and  very  striped  cuffs.  He  said,  in  answer  to 
Betsy's  inquiry:  " Vaughan?  Will  Vaughan? 
Never  heard  the  name,"  and  immediately  went 
on  whistling  and  looking  up  and  down  the  aisle 
over  the  heads  of  the  little  girls,  who  stood  gaz- 
ing up  at  him  with  very  wide,  startled  eyes. 
An  older  man  leaned  over  from  the  next  booth 
and  said : ' '  Will  Vaughan  ?  He  from  Hillsboro  ? 
Well,  I  heard  somebody  say  those  Hillsboro 
Vaughans  had  word  one  of  their  cows  was  awful 
sick,  and  they  had  to  start  right  home  that 
minute." 

Betsy  came  to  herself  out  of  her  momentary 
daze  and  snatched  Molly's  hand.  "Hurry! 
quick !  We  must  find  the  Wendells  before  they 
get  away!" 

In  her  agitation  (for  she  was  really  very 
much  frightened)  she  forgot  how  easily  terri- 


210  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

fied  little  Molly  was.  Her  alarm  instantly  sent 
the  child  into  a  panic.  "Oh,  Betsy!  Betsy! 
What  will  we  do!"  she  gasped,  as  Betsy  pulled 
her  along  the  aisle  and  out  of  the  door. 

"Oh,  the  Wendells  can't  be  gone  yet,"  said 
Betsy  reassuringly,  though  she  was  not  at  all 
sure  she  was  telling  the  truth.  She  ran  as  fast 
as  she  could  drag  Molly's  fat  legs,  to  the  horse- 
shed  where  Mr.  Wendell  had  tied  his  horses  and 
left  the  surrey.  The  horse-shed  was  empty, 
quite  empty. 

Betsy  stopped  short  and  stood  still,  her  heart 
seeming  to  be  up  in  her  throat  so  that  she  could 
hardly  breathe.  After  all,  she  was  only  ten  that 
day,  you  must  remember.  Molly  began  to  cry 
loudly,  hiding  her  weeping  face  in  Betsy's 
dress.  "What  will  we  do,  Betsy!  What  can 
we  do!"  she  wailed. 

Betsy  did  not  answer.  She  did  not  know 
what  they  would  do!  They  were  eight  miles 
from  Putney  Farm,  far  too  much  for  Molly  to 
walk,  and  anyhow  neither  of  them  knew  the 
way.    They  had  only  ten  cents  left,  and  nothing 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  211 

to  eat.  And  the  only  people  they  knew  in  all 
that  throng  of  strangers  had  gone  back  to  Hills- 
boro. 

"What  will  we  do,  Betsy?"  Molly  kept  on 
crying  out,  horrified  by  Betsy's  silence  and  evi- 
dent consternation. 

The  other  child's  head  swam.  She  tried  again 
the  formula  which  had  helped  her  when  Molly 
fell  into  the  Wolf  Pit,  and  asked  herself,  des- 
perately, "What  would  Cousin  Ann  do  if  she 
were  here?"  But  that  did  not  help  her  much 
now,  because  she  could  not  possibly  imagine 
what  Cousin  Ann  would  do  under  such  appall- 
ing circumstances.  Yes,  one  thing  Cousin  Ann 
would  be  sure  to  do,  of  course ;  she  would  quiet 
Molly  first  of  all. 

At  this  thought  Betsy  sat  down  on  the 
ground  and  took  the  panic-stricken  little  girl 
into  her  lap,  wiping  away  the  tears  and  saying, 
stoutly,  "Now,  Molly,  stop  crying  this  minute. 
I'll  take  care  of  you,  of  course.  I'll  get  you 
home  all  right." 

"How '11   you   ever   do   it?"    sobbed   Molly. 


212  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

1  'Everybody's  gone  and  left  us.  "We  can't 
walk!" 

"Never  you  mind  how,"  said  Betsy,  trying 
to  be  facetious  and  mock-mysterious,  though 
her  own  under  lip  was  quivering  a  little. 
"That's  my  surprise  party  for  you.  Just  you 
wait.  Now  come  on  back  to  that  booth.  Maybe 
Will  Vaughan  didn't  go  home  with  his  folks." 

She  had  very  little  hope  of  this,  and  only 
went  back  there  because  it  seemed  to  her  a 
little  less  dauntingly  strange  than  every  other 
spot  in  the  howling  wilderness  about  her ;  for  all 
at  once  the  Fair,  which  had  seemed  so  lively  and 
cheerful  and  gay  before,  seemed  now  a  horrible, 
frightening,  noisy  place,  full  of  hurried  stran- 
gers who  came  and  went  their  own  ways,  with 
not  a  glance  out  of  their  hard  eyes  for  two 
little  girls  stranded  far  from  home. 

The  bright-colored  young  man  was  no  better 
when  they  found  him  again.  He  stopped  his 
whistling  only  long  enough  to  say,  "Nope,  no 
Will  Vaughan  anywhere  around  these  diggings 
yet." 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  213 

"We  were  going  home  with  the  Vaughans," 
murmured  Betsy,  in  a  low  tone,  hoping  for 
some  help  from  him. 

"Looks  as  though  you'd  better  go  home  on 
the  cars,"  advised  the  young  man  casually. 
He  smoothed  his  black  hair  back  straighter  than 
ever  from  his  forehead  and  looked  over  their 
heads. 

"How  much  does  it  cost  to  go  to  Hillsboro 
on  the  cars?"  asked  Betsy  with  a  sinking 
heart. 

"You'll  have  to  ask  somebody  else  about 
that,"  said  the  young  man.  "What  I  don't 
know  about  this  Rube  state !  I  never  was  in  it 
before."  He  spoke  as  though  he  were  very 
proud  of  the  fact. 

Betsy  turned  and  went  over  to  the  older  man 
who  had  told  them  about  the  Vaughans. 

Molly  trotted  at  her  heels,  quite  comforted, 
now  that  Betsy  was  talking  so  competently  to 
grown-ups.  She  did  not  hear  what  they  said, 
nor  try  to.  Now  that  Betsy's  voice  sounded 
all  right  she  had  no  more  fears.    Betsy  would 


214  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

manage  somehow.  She  heard  Betsy's  voice 
again  talking  to  the  other  man,  but  she  was  busy 
looking  at  an  exhibit  of  beautiful  jelly  glasses, 
and  paid  no  attention.  Then  Betsy  led  her  away 
again  out  of  doors,  where  everybody  was  walk- 
ing back  and  forth  under  the  bright  September 
sky,  blowing  on  horns,  waving  plumes  of  bril- 
liant tissue-paper,  tickling  each  other  with 
peacock  feathers,  and  eating  pop-corn  and 
candy  out  of  paper  bags. 

That  reminded  Molly  that  they  had  ten  cents 
yet.  "Oh,  Betsy,"  she  proposed,  "let's  take  a 
nickel  of  our  money  for  some  pop-corn." 

She  was  startled  by  Betsy's  fierce  sudden 
clutch  at  their  little  purse  and  by  the  quaver  in 
her  voice  as  she  answered:  "No,  no,  Molly. 
We've  got  to  save  every  cent  of  that.  I've 
found  out  it  costs  thirty  cents  for  us  both  to 
go  home  to  Hillsboro  on  the  train.  The  last  one 
goes  at  six  o'clock." 

"We  haven't  got  but  ten,"  said  Molly. 

Betsy  looked  at  her  silently  for  a  moment  and 
then  burst  out,  "I'll  earn  the  rest!  I'll  earn  it 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  215 

somehow!  I'll  have  to!  There  isn't  any  other 
way ! ' ' 

"All  right,"  said  Molly  quaintly,  not  seeing 
anything  unusual  in  this.  "You  can,  if  you 
want  to.    I'll  wait  for  you  here." 

"No,  you  won't!"  cried  Betsy,  who  had  quite 
enough  of  trying  to  meet  people  in  a  crowd. 
"No,  you  won't!  You  just  follow  me  every 
minute!    I  don't  want  you  out  of  my  sight!" 

They  began  to  move  forward  now,  Betsy's 
eyes  wildly  roving  from  one  place  to  another. 
How  could  a  little  girl  earn  money  at  a  coun- 
ty fair!  She  was  horribly  afraid  to  go  up 
and  speak  to  a  stranger,  and  yet  how  else  could 
she  begin? 

"Here,  Molly,  you  wait  here,"  she  said. 
"Don't  you  budge  till  I  come  back."  . 

But  alas !  Molly  had  only  a  moment  to  wait 
that  time,  for  the  man  who  was  selling  lemon- 
ade answered  Betsy's  shy  question  with  a  stare 
and  a  curt,  "Lord,  no!  What  could  a  young- 
one  like  you  do  for  me  ? " 

The  little  girls  wandered  on,  Molly  calm  and 


216  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

expectant,  confident  in  Betsy;  Betsy  with  a  very 
dry  mouth  and  a  very  gone  feeling.  They  were 
passing  by  a  big  shed-like  building  now,  where 
a  large  sign  proclaimed  that  the  Woodford 
Ladies'  Aid  Society  would  serve  a  hot  chicken 
dinner  for  thirty-five  cents.  Of  course  the  sign 
was  not  accurate,  for  at  half -past  three,  almost 
four,  the  chicken  dinner  had  long  ago  been  all 
eaten  and  in  place  of  the  diners  was  a  group 
of  weary  women  moving  languidly  about  or 
standing  saggingly  by  a  great  table  piled  with 
dirty  dishes.  Betsy  paused  here,  meditated 
a  moment,  and  went  in  rapidly  so  that  her  cour- 
age would  not  evaporate. 

The  woman  with  gray  hair  looked  down  at 
her  a  little  impatiently  and  said,  "Dinner's  all 
over. ' ' 

"I  didn't  come  for  dinner,"  said  Betsy,  swal- 
lowing hard.  "I  came  to  see  if  you  wouldn't 
hire  me  to  wash  your  dishes.  I'll  do  them  for 
twenty-five  cents." 

The  woman  laughed,  looked  from  little  Betsy 
to  the  great  pile  of  dishes,  and  said,  turning 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  217 

away,  "  Mercy,  child,  if  you  washed  from  now 
till  morning,  you  wouldn't  make  a  hole  in  what 
we've  got  to  do." 

Betsy  heard  her  say  to  the  other  women, 
' '  Some  young  one  wanting  more  money  for  the 
side-shows." 

Now,  now  was  the  moment  to  remember 
what  Cousin  Ann  would  have  done.  She  would 
certainly  not  have  shaken  all  over  with  hurt 
feelings  nor  have  allowed  the  tears  to  come 
stingingly  to  her  eyes.  So  Betsy  sternly  made 
herself  stop  doing  these  things.  And  Cousin 
Ann  wouldn't  have  given  way  to  the  dreadful 
sinking  feeling  of  utter  discouragement,  but 
would  have  gone  right  on  to  the  next  place. 
So,  although  Betsy  felt  like  nothing  so  much 
as  crooking  her  elbow  over  her  face  and  crying 
as  hard  as  she  could  cry,  she  stiffened  her  back, 
took  Molly's  hand  again,  and  stepped  out,  heart- 
sick within  but  very  steady  (although  rather 
pale)  without. 

She  and  Molly  walked  along  in  the  crowd 
again,  Molly  laughing  and  pointing  out  the 


218  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

pranks  and  antics  of  the  young  people,  who 
were  feeling  livelier  than  ever  as  the  afternoon 
wore  on.  Betsy  looked  at  them  grimly  with 
unseeing  eyes.  It  was  four  o'clock.  The  last 
train  for  Hillsboro  left  in  two  hours  and  she 
was  no  nearer  having  the  price  of  the  tickets. 
She  stopped  for  a  moment  to  get  her  breath; 
for,  although  they  were  walking  slowly,  she 
kept  feeling  breathless  and  choked.  It  occurred 
to  her  that  if  ever  a  little  girl  had  had  a  more 
horrible  birthday  she  never  heard  of  one! 

"Oh,  I  wish  I  could,  Dan!"  said  a  young 
voice  near  her.  "But  honest!  Momma 'd  just 
eat  me  up  alive  if  I  left  the  booth  for  a  minute ! ' ' 

Betsy  turned  quickly.  A  very  pretty  girl 
with  yellow  hair  and  blue  eyes  (she  looked  as 
Molly  might  when  she  was  grown  up)  was  lean- 
ing over  the  edge  of  a  little  canvas-covered 
booth,  the  sign  of  which  announced  that  home- 
made doughnuts  and  soft  drinks  were  for  sale 
there.  A  young  man,  very  flushed  and  gay,  was 
pulling  at  the  girl's  blue  gingham  sleeve.  "Oh, 
come  on,  Annie.     Just  one  turn!     The  floor's 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  219 

elegant.  You  can  keep  an  eye  on  the  booth  from 
the  hall!  Nobody's  going  to  run  away  with  the 
old  thing  anyhow!" 

"Honest,  I'd  love  to!  But  I  got  a  great  lot 
of  dishes  to  wash,  too!  You  know  Momma!" 
She  looked  longingly  toward  the  open-air  danc- 
ing floor,  out  from  which  just  then  floated  a 
burst  of  brazen  music. 

"Oh,  please!"  said  a  small  voice.  "I'll  do  it 
for  twenty  cents." 

Betsy  stood  by  the  girl's  elbow,  all  quivering 
earnestness. 

"Do  what,  kiddie?"  asked  the  girl  in  a  good- 
natured  surprise. 

"Everything!"  said  Betsy,  compendiously. 
"Everything!  Wash  the  dishes,  tend  the  booth; 
you  can  go  dance !    I'll  do  it  for  twenty  cents." 

The  eyes  of  the  girl  and  the  man  met  in  high 
amusement.  "My!  Aren't  we  up  and  com- 
ing!" said  the  man.  "Y'ou're  most  as  big  as 
a  pint-cup,  aren't  you?"  he  said  to  Betsy. 

The  little  girl  flushed — she  detested  being 
laughed  at — but  she  looked  straight  into  the 


220  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

laughing  eyes.  "I'm  ten  years  old  today,"  she 
said,  "and  I  can  wash  dishes  as  well  as  any- 
body. ' '    She  spoke  with  dignity. 

The  young  man  burst  out  into  a  great  laugh. 

"Great  kid,  what?"  he  said  to  the  girl,  and 
then,  "Say,  Annie,  why  not?  Your  mother 
won't  be  here  for  an  hour.  The  kid  can  keep 
folks  from  walking  off  with  the  dope  and  ..." 

"I'll  do  the  dishes,  too,"  repeated  Betsy,  try- 
ing hard  not  to  mind  being  laughed  at,  and 
keeping  her  eyes  fixed  steadily  on  the  tickets  to 
Hillsboro. 

"Well,  by  gosh,"  said  the  young  man,  laugh- 
ing. "Here's  our  chance,  Annie,  for  fair !  Come 
along!" 

The  girl  laughed,  too,  out  of  high  spirits. 
"Wouldn't  Momma  be  crazy!"  she  said  hilari- 
ously. "But  she'll  never  know.  Here,  you  cute 
kid,  here's  my  apron."  She  took  off  her 
long  apron  and  tied  it  around  Betsy's  neck. 
"There's  the  soap,  there's  the  table.  You  stack 
the  dishes  up  on  that  counter." 

She  was  out  of  the  little  gate  in  the  counter  in 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  221 

a  twinkling,  just  as  Molly,  in  answer  to  a  beckon- 
ing gesture  from  Betsy,  came  in.  ''Hello, 
there's  another  one!"  said  the  gay  young  man, 
gayer  and  gayer.  "Hello,  button!  What  you 
going  to  do?  I  suppose  when  they  try  to  crack 
the  safe  you'll  run  at  them  and  bark  and  drive 
them  away!" 

Molly  opened  her  sweet,  blue  eyes  very  wide, 
not  understanding  a  single  word.  The  girl 
laughed,  swooped  back,  gave  Molly  a  kiss,  and 
disappeared,  running  side  by  side  with  the 
young  man  toward  the  dance  hall. 

Betsy  mounted  on  a  soap  box  and  began  joy- 
fully to  wash  the  dishes.  She  had  never  thought 
that  ever  in  her  life  would  she  simply  love  to 
wash  dishes  beyond  anything  else !  But  it  was 
so.  Her  relief  was  so  great  that  she  could  have 
kissed  the  coarse,  thick  plates  and  glasses  as 
she  washed  them. 

"It's  all  right,  Molly;  it's  all  right!"  she 
quavered  exultantly  to  Molly  over  her  shoulder. 
But  as  Molly  had  not  (from  the  moment  Betsy 
took  command)   suspected  that  it  was  not  all 


222  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

right,  she  only  nodded  and  asked  if  she  might 
sit  up  on  a  barrel  where  she  could  watch  the 
crowd  go  by. 

"I  guess  you  could.  I  don't  know  why  not," 
said  Betsy  doubtfully.  She  lifted  her  up  and 
went  back  to  her  dishes.  Never  were  dishes 
washed  better! 

"Two  doughnuts,  please,"  said  a  man's  voice 
behind  her. 

Oh,  mercy,  there  was  somebody  come  to 
buy !  Whatever  should  she  do  ?  She  came  for- 
ward intending  to  say  that  the  owner  of  the 
booth  was  away  and  she  didn't  know  anything 
about  .  .  .  but  the  man  laid  down  a  nickel,  took 
two  doughnuts,  and  turned  away.  Betsy  gasped 
and  looked  at  the  home-made  sign  stuck  into  the 
big  pan  of  doughnuts.  Sure  enough,  it  read  "2 
for  5."  She  put  the  nickel  up  on  a  shelf  and 
went  back  to  her  dishwashing.  Selling  things 
wasn't  so  hard,  she  reflected. 

As  her  hunted  feeling  of  desperation  relaxed 
she  began  to  find  some  fun  in  her  new  situation, 
and  when  a  woman  with  two  little  boys  ap- 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  223 

proached  she  came  forward  to  wait  on  her, 
elated,  important.  "Two  for  five,"  she  said  in 
a  businesslike  tone.  The  woman  put  down  a 
dime,  took  up  four  doughnuts,  divided  them  be- 
tween her  sons,  and  departed. 

"My!"  said  Molly,  looking  admiringly  at 
Betsy's  coolness  over  this  transaction.  Betsy 
went  back  to  her  dishes,  stepping  high. 

"Oh,  Betsy,  see!  The  pig!  The  big  ox!" 
cried  Molly  now,  looking  from  her  coign  of  van- 
tage down  the  wide,  grass-grown  lane  between 
the  booths. 

Betsy  craned  her  head  around  over  her 
shoulder,  continuing  conscientiously  to  wash 
and  wipe  the  dishes.  The  prize  stock  was  being 
paraded  around  the  Fair;  the  great  prize  ox, 
his  shining  horns  tipped  with  blue  rosettes ;  the 
prize  cows,  with  wreaths  around  their  necks; 
the  prize  horses,  four  or  five  of  them  as  glossy 
as  satin,  curving  their  bright,  strong  necks  and 
stepping  as  though  on  eggs,  their  manes  and 
tails  braided  with  bright  ribbon ;  and  then, ' '  Oh, 
Betsy,  look  at  the  pig!"  screamed  Molly  again — 


224  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

the  smaller  animals,  the  sheep,  the  calves,  the 
colts,  and  the  pig,  which  waddled  along  with 
portly  dignity. 

Betsy  looked  as  well  as  she  could  over  her 
shoulder  .  .  .  and  in  years  to  come  she  can 
shut  her  eyes  and  see  again  in  every  detail  that 
rustic  procession  under  the  golden,  September 
light. 

But  she  looked  anxiously  at  the  clock.  It  was 
nearing  five.  Oh,  suppose  the  girl  forgot  and 
danced  too  long! 

"Two  bottles  of  ginger  ale  and  half  a  dozen 
doughnuts,"  said  a  man  with  a  woman  and 
three  children. 

Betsy  looked  feverishly  among  the  bottles 
ranged  on  the  counter,  selected  two  marked 
ginger  ale,  and  glared  at  their  corrugated  tin 
stoppers.    How  did  you  get  them  open? 

"Here's  your  opener,"  said  the  man,  "if 
that's  what  you're  looking  for.  Here,  you  get 
the  glasses  and  I'll  open  the  bottles.  We're  in 
kind  of  a  hurry.    Got  to  catch  a  train." 

Well,  they  were  not  the  only  people  who  had 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  225 

to  catch  a  train,  Betsy  thought  sadly.  The/ 
drank  in  gulps  and  departed,  cramming  dough- 
nuts into  their  mouths.  Betsy  wished  ardently 
that  the  girl  would  come  back.  She  was  now 
almost  sure  that  she  had  forgotten  and  would 
dance  there  till  nightfall.  But  there,  there  she 
came,  running  along,  as  light-footed  after  an 
hour's  dancing  as  when  she  had  left  the  booth. 

"Here  you  are,  kid,"  said  the  young  man, 
producing  a  quarter.  "We've  had  the  time  of 
our  young  lives,  thanks  to  you. ' ' 

Betsy  gave  him  back  one  of  the  nickels  that 
remained  to  her,  but  he  refused  it. 

"No,  keep  the  change,"  he  said  royally.  "It 
was  worth  it." 

"Then  I'll  buy  two  doughnuts  with  my  extra 
nickel,"  said  Betsy. 

"No,  you  won't,"  said  the  girl.  "You'll 
take  all  you  want  for  nothing  .  .  .  Momma '11 
never  miss  'em.  And  what  you  sell  here  has 
got  to  be  fresh  every  day.  Here,  hold  out  your 
hands,  both  of  you. ' ' 

"Some  people  came  and  bought  things,"  said 


226  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Betsy,  happening  to  remember  as  she  and  Molly 
turned  away.    "The  money  is  on  that  shelf." 

"Well,  now!"  said  the  girl,  "if  she  didn't 
take  hold  and  sell  things !  Say  .  .  . ' ' — she  ran 
after  Betsy  and  gave  her  a  hug — "you  smart 
young  one,  I  wish't  I  had  a  little  sister  just 
like  you!" 

Molly  and  Betsy  hurried  along  out  of  the 
gate  into  the  main  street  of  the  town  and  down 
to  the  station.  Molly  was  eating  doughnuts  as 
she  went.  They  were  both  quite  hungry  by  this 
time,  but  Betsy  could  not  think  of  eating  till 
she  had  those  tickets  in  her  hand. 

She  pushed  her  quarter  and  a  nickel  into  the 
ticket-seller's  window  and  said  "Hillsboro"  in 
as  confident  a  tone  as  she  could;  but  when  the 
precious  bits  of  paper  were  pushed  out  at  her 
and  she  actually  held  them,  her  knees  shook 
under  her  and  she  had  to  go  and  sit  down  on 
the  bench. 

"My!  Aren't  these  doughnuts  good?"  said 
Molly.  ' i  I  never  in  my  life  had  enough  dough- 
nuts before!" 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  227 

Betsy  drew  a  long  breath  and  began  rather 
languidly  to  eat  one  herself;  she  felt,  all  of  a 
sudden,  very,  very  tired. 

She  was  tireder  still  when  they  got  out  of 
the  train  at  Hillsboro  Station  and  started 
wearily  up  the  road  toward  Putney  Farm.  Two 
miles  lay  before  them,  two  miles  which  they  had 
often  walked  before,  but  never  after  such  a  day 
as  now  lay  back  of  them.  Molly  dragged  her 
feet  as  she  walked  and  hung  heavily  on  Betsy's 
hand.  Betsy  plodded  along,  her  head  hanging, 
her  eyes  all  gritty  with  fatigue  and  sleepiness. 
A  light  buggy  spun  round  the  turn  of  the  road 
behind  them,  the  single  horse  trotting  fast  as 
though  the  driver  were  in  a  hurry,  the  wheels 
rattling  smartly  on  the  hard  road.  The  little 
girls  drew  out  to  one  side  and  stood  waiting 
till  the  road  should  be  free  again.  When  he 
saw  them  the  driver  pulled  the  horse  back  so 
quickly  it  stood  almost  straight  up.  He  peered 
at  them  through  the  twilight  and  then  with  a 
loud  shout  sprang  over  the  side  of  the  buggy. 

It  was  Uncle  Henry — oh,  goody,  it  was  Uncle 


228  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Henry  come  to  meet  them !    They  wouldn't  have 

to  walk  any  further ! 

But  what  was  the  matter  with  Uncle  Henry? 
He  ran  up  to  them,  exclaiming,  "Are  ye  all 
right?  Are  ye  all  right?"  He  stooped  over 
and  felt  of  them  desperately  as  though  he 
expected  them  to  be  broken  somewhere.  And 
Betsy  could  feel  that  his  old  hands  were  shak- 
ing, that  he  was  trembling  all  over.  When  she 
said,  "Why,  yes,  Uncle  Henry,  we're  all  right. 
We  came  home  on  the  cars,"  Uncle  Henry 
leaned  up  against  the  fence  as  though  he 
couldn't  stand  up.  He  took  off  his  hat  and 
wiped  his  forehead  and  he  said — it  didn't  seem 
as  though  it  could  be  Uncle  Henry  talking,  he 
sounded  so  excited — "Well,  well — well,  by  gosh ! 
My!  Well,  by  thunder!  Now!  And  so  here 
ye  are!    And  you're  all  right!    Well!" 

He  couldn't  seem  to  stop  exclaiming,  and 
you  can't  imagine  anything  stranger  than  an 
Uncle  Henry  who  couldn't  stop  exclaiming. 

After  they  all  got  into  the  buggy  he  quieted 
down  a  little  and  said,  "  Thunderation !     But 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  2297 

we've  had  a  scare!  When  the  Wendells  come 
back  with  their  cousins  early  this  afternoon, 
they  said  you  were  coming  with  the  Vaughans. 
And  then  when  you  didn't  come  and  didn't 
come,  we  telephoned  to  the  Vaughans,  and  they 
said  they  hadn't  seen  hide  nor  hair  of  ye,  and 
didn't  even  know  you  were  to  the  Fair  at  all! 
I  tell  you,  your  Aunt  Abigail  and  I  had  an 
awful  turn!  Ann  and  I  hitched  up  quicker 'n 
scat  and  she  put  right  out  with  Prince  up 
toward  Woodford  and  I  took  Jessie  down  this 
way;  thought  maybe  I'd  get  trace  of  ye  some- 
where here.  Well,  land!"  He  wiped  his  fore- 
head again.  ' '  Wa  'n  't  I  glad  to  see  you  standin ' 
there  .  .  .  get  along,  Jess !  I  want  to  get  the 
news  to  Abigail  soon  as  I  can!" 

"Now  tell  me  what  in  thunder  did  happen  to 
you!" 

Betsy  began  at  the  beginning  and  told 
straight  through,  interrupted  at  first  by  indig- 
nant comments  from  Uncle  Henry,  who  was  out- 
raged by  the  Wendells'  loose  wearing  of  their 
responsibility  for  the  children.     But  as   she 


230  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

went  on  he  quieted  down  to  a  closely  attentive 
silence,  interrupting  only  to  keep  Jess  at  her 
top  speed. 

Now  that  it  was  all  safely  over,  Betsy  thought 
her  story  quite  an  interesting  one,  and  she 
omitted  no  detail,  although  she  wondered  once 
or  twice  if  perhaps  Uncle  Henry  were  listening 
to  her,  he  kept  so  still.  "And  so  I  bought  the 
tickets  and  we  got  home,"  she  ended,  adding, 
"Oh,  Uncle  Henry,  you  ought  to  have  seen  the 
prize  pig !    He  was  too  funny ! ' ' 

They  turned  into  the  Putney  yard  now  and 
saw  Aunt  Abigail's  bulky  form  on  the  porch. 

' '  Got  'em,  Abby !  All  right !  No  harm  done ! ' ' 
shouted  Uncle  Henry. 

Aunt  Abigail  turned  without  a  word  and 
went  back  into  the  house.  When  the  little  girls 
dragged  their  weary  legs  in  they  found  her 
quietly  setting  out  some  supper  for  them  on 
the  table,  but  she  was  wiping  away  with  her 
apron  the  joyful  tears  which  ran  down  her 
cheeks,  such  white  cheeks !  It  seemed  so  strange 
to  see  rosy  Aunt  Abigail  with  a  face  like  paper. 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  231 

"Well,  I'm  glad  to  see  ye,"  she  told  them 
soberly.  "Sit  right  down  and  have  some  hot 
milk.    I  had  some  all  ready." 

The  telephone  rang,  she  went  into  the  next 
room,  and  they  heard  her  saying,  in  an  un- 
steady voice:  "All  right,  Ann.  They're  here. 
Your  father  just  brought  them  in.  I  haven't 
had  time  to  hear  about  what  happened  yet.  But 
they're  all  right.    You'd  better  come  home." 

"That's  your  Cousin  Ann  telephoning  from 
the  Marshalls'." 

She  herself  went  and  sat  down  heavily,  and 
when  Uncle  Henry  came  in  a  few  minutes  later 
she  asked  him  in  a  rather  weak  voice  for  the 
ammonia  bottle.  He  rushed  for  it,  got  her  a 
fan  and  a  drink  of  cold  water,  and  hung  over 
her  anxiously  till  the  color  began  to  come  back 
into  her  pale  face.  "I  know  just  how  you  feel, 
Mother,"  he  said  sympathetically.  "When  I 
saw  'em  standin'  there  by  the  roadside  I  felt  as 
though  somebody  had  hit  me  a  clip  right  in 
the  pit  of  the  stomach." 

The  little  girls  ate  their  supper  in  a  tired 


232  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

daze,  not  paying  any  attention  to  what  the 
grown-ups  were  saying,  until  rapid  hoofs 
clicked  on  the  stones  outside  and  Cousin  Ann 
came  in  quickly,  her  black  eyes  snapping. 

"Now,  for  mercy's  sake,  tell  me  what  hap- 
pened," she  said,  adding  hotly,  "and  if  I  don't 
give  that  Maria  Wendell  a  piece  of  my  mind ! ' ' 

Uncle  Henry  broke  in:  "I'm  going  to  tell 
what  happened.  I  want  to  do  it.  You  and 
Mother  just  listen,  just  sit  right  down  and 
listen."  His  voice  was  shaking  with  feeling, 
and  as  he  went  on  and  told  of  Betsy's  after- 
noon, her  fright,  her  confusion,  her  forming  the 
plan  of  coming  home  on  the  train  and  of  earn- 
ing the  money  for  the  tickets,  he  made,  for  once, 
no  Putney  pretense  of  casual  coolness.  His  old 
eyes  flashed  fire  as  he  talked. 

Betsy,  watching  him,  felt  her  heart  swell  and 
beat  fast  in  incredulous  joy.  Why,  he  was 
proud  of  her !  She  had  done  something  to  make 
the  Putney  cousins  proud  of  her! 

When  Uncle  Henry  came  to  the  part  where 
she  went  on  asking  for  employment  after  one 


BETSY  HAS  A  BIRTHDAY  233 

and  then  another  refusal,  Cousin  Ann  reached 
out  her  long  arms  and  quickly,  almost  roughly, 
gathered  Betsy  up  on  her  lap,  holding  her  close 
as  she  listened.  Betsy  had  never  before  sat  on 
Cousin  Ann's  lap. 

And  when  Uncle  Henry  finished — he  had  not 
forgotten  a  single  thing  Betsy  had  told  him — 
and  asked,  ''What  do  you  think  of  that  for  a 
little  girl  ten  years  old  today?"  Cousin  Ann 
opened  the  flood-gates  wide  and  burst  out,  "I 
think  I  never  heard  of  a  child's  doing  a  smarter, 
grittier  thing  .  .  .  and  I  don't  care  if  she  does 
hear  me  say  so!" 

It  was  a  great,  a  momentous,  an  historic 
moment ! 

Betsy,  enthroned  on  those  strong  knees,  won- 
dered if  any  little  girl  had  ever  had  such  a  beau- 
tiful birthday. 


CHAPTER  XI 
"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  " 

About  a  month  after  Betsy's  birthday,  one 
October  day  when  the  leaves  were  all  red  and 
yellow,  two  very  momentous  events  occurred, 
and,  in  a  manner  of  speaking,  at  the  very  same 
time.  Betsy  had  noticed  that  her  kitten  Eleanor 
(she  still  thought  of  her  as  a  kitten,  although 
she  was  now  a  big,  grown-up  cat)  spent  very 
little  time  around  the  house.  She  came  into 
the  kitchen  two  or  three  times  a  day,  mewing 
loudly  for  milk  and  food,  but  after  eating  very 
fast  she  always  disappeared  at  once.  Betsy 
missed  the  purring,  contented  ball  of  fur  on 
her  lap  in  the  long  evenings  as  she  played 
checkers,  or  read  aloud,  or  sewed,  or  played 
guessing  games.  She  felt  rather  hurt,  too,  that 
Eleanor  paid  her  so  little  attention,  and  several 
times  she  tried  hard  to  make  her  stay,  trailing 

234 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "     235 

in  front  of  her  a  spool  tied  to  a  string  or  rolling 
a  worsted  ball  across  the  floor.  But  Eleanor 
seemed  to  have  lost  all  her  taste  for  the  things 
she  had  liked  so  much.  Invariably,  the  moment 
the  door  was  opened,  she  darted  out  and  van- 
ished. 

One  afternoon  Betsy  ran  out  after  her,  de- 
termined to  catch  her  and  bring  her  back. 
"When  the  cat  found  she  was  being  followed,  she 
bounded  along  in  great  leaps,  constantly  escap- 
ing from  Betsy's  outstretched  hand.  They 
came  thus  to  the  horse-barn,  into  the  open  door 
of  which  Eleanor  whisked  like  a  little  gray 
shadow,  Betsy  close  behind.  The  cat  flashed 
up  the  steep,  ladder-like  stairs  that  led  to  the 
hay-loft.  Betsy  scrambled  rapidly  up,  too.  It 
was  dark  up  there,  compared  to  the  gorgeous- 
colored  October  day  outside,  and  for  a  moment 
she  could  not  see  Eleanor.  Then  she  made  her 
out,  a  dim  little  shape,  picking  her  way  over 
the  hay,  and  she  heard  her  talking.  Yes,  it  was 
real  talk,  quite,  quite  different  from  the  loud, 
imperious  "miauw!"  with  which  Eleanor  asked 


236  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

for  her  milk.  This  was  the  softest,  prettiest 
kind  of  conversation,  all  little  murmurs  and 
chirps  and  sing-songs.  "Why,  Betsy  could  al- 
most understand  it!  She  could  understand  it 
enough  to  know  that  it  was  love-talk,  and  then, 
breaking  into  this,  came  a  sudden  series  of 
shrill,  little,  needle-like  cries  that  fairly  filled 
the  hay-loft.  Eleanor  gave  a  bound  forward 
and  disappeared.  Betsy,  very  much  excited, 
scrambled  and  climbed  up  over  the  hay  as  fast 
as  she  could  go. 

It  was  all  silent  now — the  piercing,  funny  lit- 
tle squalls  had  stopped  as  suddenly  as  they  be- 
gan. On  the  top  in  a  little  nest  lay  Eleanor,, 
purring  so  loudly  you  could  hear  her  all  over 
the  big  mow,  and  so  proud  and  happy  she  could 
lhardly  contain  herself.  Her  eyes  glistened, 
she  arched  her  back,  rolled  over  and  spread  out 
her  paws,  disclosing  to  Betsy's  astounded,  de- 
lighted eyes — no,  she  wasn't  dreaming — two 
dear  little  kittens,  one  all  gray,  just  like  its 
mother;  one  gray  with  a  big  bib  on  his  chest. 

Oh!     How  dear  they  were!      How  darling, 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "     237 

and  cuddly,  and  fuzzy!  Betsy  put  her  fingers 
very  softly  on  the  gray  one's  head  and  thrilled 
to  feel  the  warmth  of  the  little  living  creature. 
''Oh,  Eleanor!"  she  asked  eagerly.  "Can  I 
pick  one  up?"  She  lifted  the  gray  one  gently 
and  held  it  up  to  her  cheek.  The  little  thing 
nestled  down  in  the  warm  hollow  of  her  hand. 
She  could  feel  its  tiny,  tiny  little  claws  pricking 
softly  into  her  palm.  "Oh,  you  sweetness! 
You  little,  little  baby-thing ! ' '  she  said  over  and 
over  in  a  whisper. 

Eleanor  did  not  stop  purring,  and  she  looked 
up  with  friendly,  trusting  eyes  as  her  little 
mistress  made  the  acquaintance  of  her  children, 
but  Betsy  could  feel  somehow  that  Eleanor  was 
anxious  about  her  kitten,  was  afraid  that,  al- 
though the  little  girl  meant  everything  that  was 
kind,  her  great,  clumsy,  awkward  human  hands 
weren't  clever  enough  to  hold  a  baby-cat  the 
proper  way.  "I  don't  blame  you  a  bit,  Elea- 
nor," said  Betsy.  "I  should  feel  just  so  in 
your  place.  There!  I  won't  touch  it  again!" 
She  laid  the  kitten  down  carefully  by  its  mother. 


238  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Eleanor  at  once  began  to  wash  its  face  very 
vigorously,  knocking  it  over  and  over  with  her 
strong  tongue.  "My!"  said  Betsy,  laughing. 
"You'd  scratch  my  eyes  out,  if  I  were  as  rough 
as  that!" 

Eleanor  didn't  seem  to  hear.  Or  rather  she 
seemed  to  hear  something  else.  For  she  stopped 
short,  her  head  lifted,  her  ears  pricked  up, 
listening  very  hard  to  some  distant  sound. 
Then  Betsy  heard  it,  too,  somebody  coming 
into  the  barn  below,  little,  quick,  uneven  foot- 
steps. It  must  be  little  Molly,  tagging  along,  as 
she  always  did.  What  fun  to  show  Molly  the 
kittens ! 

"Betsy!"  called  Molly  from  below. 

"Molly!"  called  Betsy  from  above.  "Come 
up  here  quick!    I've  got  something  up  here." 

There  was  a  sound  of  scrambling,  rapid  feet 
on  the  rough  stairs,  and  Molly's  yellow  curls 
appeared,  shining  in  the  dusk.  "I've  got 
a  .  .  . "  she  began,  but  Betsy  did  not  let  her 
finish. 

"Come  here,  Molly,  quick!  quick V  she  called, 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  239 

beckoning  eagerly,  as  though  the  kittens  might 
evaporate  into  thin  air  if  Molly  didn't  get  there 
at  once. 

Molly  forgot  what  she  was  going  to  say, 
climbed  madly  up  the  steep  pile  of  hay,  and  in 
a  moment  was  lying  flat  on  her  stomach  beside 
the  little  family  in  a  spasm  of  delight  that  satis- 
fied even  Betsy  and  Eleanor,  both  of  them  con- 
vinced that  these  were  the  finest  kittens  the 
world  had  ever  seen. 

"See,  there  are  two,"  said  Betsy.  "You  can 
have  one  for  your  very  own.  And  I'll  let  you 
choose.    Which  one  do  you  like  best?" 

She  was  hoping  that  Molly  would  not  take  the 
little  all-gray  one,  because  she  had  fallen  in  love 
with  that  the  minute  she  saw  it. 

"Oh,  this  one  with  the  white  on  his  breast," 
said  Molly,  without  a  moment's  hesitation. 
"It's  lots  the  prettiest!  Oh,  Betsy!  For  my 
very  own?" 

Something  white  fell  out  of  the  folds  of  her 
skirt  on  the  hay.  "Oh,  yes,"  she  said  indiffer- 
ently.   "A  letter  for  you.    Miss  Ann  told  me 


240  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

to  bring  it  out  here.     She  said  she  saw  you 
streaking  it  for  the  barn." 

It  was  a  letter  from  Aunt  Frances.  Betsy 
opened  it,  one  eye  on  Molly  to  see  that  she  did 
not  hug  her  new  darling  too  tightly,  and  began 
to  read  it  in  the  ray  of  dusty  sunlight  slanting 
in  through  a  crack  in  the  side  of  the  barn.  She 
could  do  this  easily,  because  Aunt  Frances  al- 
ways made  her  handwriting  very  large  and 
round  and  clear,  so  that  a  little  girl  could  read 
it  without  half  trying. 

And  as  she  read,  everything  faded  away 
from  before  her  .  .  .  the  barn,  Molly,  the 
kittens  .  .  .  she  saw  nothing  but  the  words  on 
the  page. 

When  she  had  read  the  letter  through  she  got 
up  quickly,  oh  ever  so  quickly!  and  went  away 
down  the  stairs.  Molly  hardly  noticed  she  had 
gone,  so  absorbing  and  delightful  were  the 
kittens. 

Betsy  went  out  of  the  dusky  barn  into  the 
rich,  October  splendor  and  saw  none  of  it.    She 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "    241 

went  straight  away  from  the  house  and  the 
barn,  straight  up  into  the  hill-pasture  toward 
her  favorite  place  beside  the  brook,  the  shady- 
pool  under  the  big  maple-tree.  At  first  she 
walked,  but  after  a  while  she  ran,  faster  and 
faster,  as  though  she  could  not  get  there  soon 
enough.  Her  head  was  down,  and  one  arm  was 
crooked  over  her  face.  .   .   . 

And  do  you  know,  I'm  not  going  to  follow  her 
up  there,  nor  let  you  go.  I'm  afraid  we  would 
all  cry  if  we  saw  what  Betsy  did  under  the  big 
maple-tree.  And  the  very  reason  she  ran  away 
so  fast  was  so  that  she  could  be  all  by  herself 
for  a  very  hard  hour,  and  fight  it  out,  alone. 

So  let  us  go  back  soberly  to  the  orchard  where 
the  Putneys  are,  and  wait  till  Betsy  comes 
walking  listlessly  in,  her  eyes  red  and  her 
cheeks  pale.  Cousin  Ann  was  up  in  the  top  of 
a  tree,  a  basket  hung  over  her  shoulder  half  full 
of  striped  red  Northern  Spies;  Uncle  Henry 
was  on  a  ladder  against  another  tree,  filling  a 
bag  with  the  beautiful,  shining,  yellow-green 
Pound  Sweets,  and  Aunt  Abigail  was  moving 


242  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

around,  picking  up  the  parti-colored  windfalls 
and  putting  them  into  barrels  ready  to  go  to 
the  cider-mill. 

Something  about  the  way  Betsy  walked,  and 
as  she  drew  closer  something  about  the  expres- 
sion of  her  face,  and  oh !  as  she  began  to  speak, 
something  about  the  tone  of  her  voice,  stopped 
all  this  cheerful  activity  as  though  a  bomb  had 
gone  off  in  their  midst. 

"I've  had  a  letter  from  Aunt  Frances,"  said 
Betsy,  biting  her  lips,  "and  she  says  she's  com- 
ing to  take  me  away,  back  to  them,  tomorrow. ' ' 

There  was  a  big  silence;  Cousin  Ann  stood, 
perfectly  motionless  up  in  her  tree,  staring 
down  through  the  leaves  at  Betsy.  Uncle  Henry 
was  turned  around  on  his  ladder,  one  hand  on 
an  apple  as  though  it  had  frozen  there,  staring 
down  at  Betsy.  Aunt  Abigail  leaned  with  both 
fat  hands  on  her  barrel,  staring  hard  at  Betsy. 
Betsy  was  staring  down  at  her  shoes,  biting 
her  lips  and  winking  her  eyes.  The  yellow, 
hazy  October  sun  sank  slowly  down  toward  the 
rim  of  Hemlock  Mountain,  and  sent  long,  golden 


Betsy  was  staring  down  at  her  shoes,  biting  her  lips  and  winking 
her  eyes. 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  243 

shafts  of  light  through  the  branches  of  the  trees 
upon  this  group  of  people,  all  so  silent,  so  mo- 
tionless. 

Betsy  was  the  first  to  speak,  and  I'm  very 
proud  of  her  for  what  she  said.  She  said, 
loyally,  "Dear  Aunt  Frances !  She  was  always 
so  sweet  to  me!  She  always  tried  so  hard  to 
take  care  of  me!" 

For  that  was  what  Betsy  had  found  up  by 
the  brook  under  the  big  red  maple-tree.  She 
had  found  there  a  certainty  that,  whatever  else 
she  did,  she  must  not  hurt  Aunt  Frances's  feel- 
ings— dear,  gentle,  sweet  Aunt  Frances,  whose 
feelings  were  so  easily  hurt  and  who  had  given 
her  so  many  years  of  such  anxious  care.  Some- 
thing up  there  had  told  her — perhaps  the  quiet 
blue  shadow  of  Windward  Mountain  creeping 
slowly  over  the  pasture  toward  her,  perhaps  the 
silent  glory  of  the  great  red-and-gold  tree,  per- 
haps the  singing  murmur  of  the  little  brook — 
perhaps  all  of  them  together  had  told  her  that 
now  had  come  a  time  when  she  must  do  more 
than  what  Cousin  Ann  would  do — when   she 


244  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

must  do  what  she  herself  knew  was  right.    And 

that  was  to  protect  Aunt  Frances  from  hurt. 

When  she  spoke,  out  there  in  the  orchard, 
she  broke  the  spell  of  silence.  Cousin  Ann 
climbed  hastily  down  from  her  tree,  with  her 
basket  only  partly  filled.  Uncle  Henry  got  stiffly 
off  his  ladder,  and  Aunt  Abigail  advanced 
through  the  grass.  And  they  all  said  the  same 
thing — "Let  me  see  that  letter." 

They  read  it  there,  looking  over  each  other's 
shoulders,  with  grave  faces.  Then,  still  silently, 
they  all  turned  and  went  back  into  the  house, 
leaving  their  forgotten  bags  and  barrels  and 
baskets  out  under  the  trees.  When  they  found 
themselves  in  the  kitchen — "Well,  it's  supper- 
time,  anyhow,"  said  Cousin  Ann  hastily,  as  if 
ashamed  of  losing  her  composure,  "or  almost 
time.    We  might  as  well  get  it  now." 

"I'm  a-going  out  to  milk,"  said  Uncle  Henry 
gruffly,  although  it  was  not  nearly  his  usual 
time.  He  took  up  the  milk  pails  and  marched 
out  toward  the  barn,  stepping  heavily,  his  head 
hanging. 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "     245 

Shep  woke  up  with  a  snort  and,  getting  off 
the  couch,  gamboled  clumsily  up  to  Betsy,  wag- 
ging his  tail  and  jumping  up  on  her,  ready  for 
a  frolic.  That  was  almost  too  much  for  Betsy ! 
To  think  that  after  tomorrow  she  would 
never  see  Shep  again — nor  Eleanor!  Nor  the 
kittens !  She  choked  as  she  bent  over  Shep  and 
put  her  arms  around  his  neck  for  a  great  hug. 
But  she  mustn't  cry,  she  mustn't  hurt  Aunt 
Frances's  feelings,  or  show  that  she  wasn't 
glad  to  go  back  to  her.  That  wouldn't  be  fair, 
after  all  Aunt  Frances  had  done  for  her ! 

That  night  she  lay  awake  after  she  and  Molly 
had  gone  to  bed  and  Molly  was  asleep.  They 
had  decided  not  to  tell  Molly  until  the  last 
minute,  so  she  had  dropped  off  peacefully, 
as  usual.  But  poor  Betsy's  eyes  were  wide 
open.  She  saw  a  gleam  of  light  under  the  door. 
It  widened;  the  door  opened.  Aunt  Abigail 
stood  there,  in  her  night  cap,  mountainous  in 
her  long  white  gown,  a  candle  shining  up  into 
her  serious  old  face. 

"You  awake,  Betsy?"  she  whispered,  seeing 


246  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

the  child's  dark  eyes  gleaming  at  her  over  the 
covers.  "I  just — I  just  thought  I'd  look  in  to 
see  if  you  were  all  right."  She  came  to  the 
edge  of  the  bed  and  set  the  candle  down  on  the 
little  stand.  Betsy  reached  her  arms  up  long- 
ingly and  the  old  woman  stooped  over  her. 
Neither  of  them  said  a  single  word  during  the 
long  embrace  which  followed.  Then  Aunt  Abi- 
gail straightened  up  hastily,  took  her  candle 
very  quickly  and  softly,  and  heavily  padded 
out  of  the  room. 

Betsy  turned  over  and  flung  one  arm  over 
Molly — no  Molly,  either,  after  tomorrow! 

She  gulped  hard  and  stared  up  at  the  ceiling, 
dimly  white  in  the  starlight.  A  gleam  of  light 
shone  under  the  door.  It  widened,  and  Uncle 
Henry  stood  there,  a  candle  in  his  hand,  peer- 
ing into  the  room.  "You  awake,  Betsy V*  he 
said  cautiously. 

"Yes.    I'm  awake,  Uncle  Henry." 

The  old  man  shuffled  into  the  room.  "I  just 
got  to  thinking,"  he  said,  hesitating,  "that 
maybe  you'd  like  to  take  my  watch  with  you. 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  247 
It's  kind  of  handy  to  have  a  watch  on  the  train. 
And  I'd  like  real  well  for  you  to  have  it." 

He  laid  it  down  on  the  stand,  his  own  cher- 
ished gold  watch,  that  had  been  given  him  when 
he  was  twenty-one. 

Betsy  reached  out  and  took  his  hard,  gnarled 
old  fist  in  a  tight  grip.  "Oh,  Uncle  Henry!" 
she  began,  and  could  not  go  on. 

"We'll  miss  you,  Betsy,"  he  said  in  an  un- 
certain voice.  "It's  been  .  .  .it's  been  real 
nice  to  have  you  here.  ..." 

And  then  he  too  snatched  up  his  candle  very 
quickly  and  almost  ran  out  of  the  room. 

Betsy  turned  over  on  her  back.  "No  crying, 
now!"  she  told  herself  fiercely.  "No  crying, 
now ! ' '  She  clenched  her  hands  together  tightly 
and  set  her  teeth. 

Something  moved  in  the  room.  Somebody 
leaned  over  her.  It  was  Cousin  Ann,  who  didn't 
make  a  sound,  not  one,  but  who  took  Betsy  in 
her  strong  arms  and  held  her  close  and  closer, 
till  Betsy  could  feel  the  quick  pulse  of  the 
other 's  heart  beating  all  through  her  own  body. 


248  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Then  she  was  gone — as  silently  as  she  came. 

But  somehow  that  great  embrace  had  taken 
away  all  the  burning  tightness  from  Betsy's 
eyes  and  heart.  She  was  very,  very  tired,  and 
soon  after  this  she  fell  sound  asleep,  snug- 
gled up  close  to  Molly. 

In  the  morning,  nobody  spoke  of  last  night 
at  all.  Breakfast  was  prepared  and  eaten,  and 
the  team  hitched  up  directly  afterward.  Betsy 
and  Uncle  Henry  were  to  drive  to  the  station 
together  to  meet  Aunt  Frances's  train.  Betsy 
put  on  her  new  wine-colored  cashmere  that 
Cousin  Ann  had  made  her,  with  the  soft  white 
collar  of  delicate  old  embroidery  that  Aunt  Abi- 
gail had  given  her  out  of  one  of  the  trunks  in 
the  attic. 

She  and  Uncle  Henry  said  very  little  as  they 
drove  to  the  village,  and  even  less  as  they  stood 
waiting  together  on  the  platform.  Betsy  slipped 
her  hand  into  his  and  he  held  it  tight  as  the 
train  whistled  in  the  distance  and  came  slowly 
and  laboriously  puffing  up  to  the  station. 

Just  one  person  got  off  at  the  little  station, 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "     249 

and  that  was  Aunt  Frances,  looking  ever  so 
dressed  up  and  citified,  with  a  fluffy  ostrich- 
feather  boa  and  kid  gloves  and  a  white  veil 
over  her  face  and  a  big  blue  one  floating  from 
her  gay-flowered  velvet  hat.  How  pretty  she 
was!  And  how  young — under  the  veil  which 
hid  so  kindly  all  the  little  lines  in  her  sweet, 
thin  face.  And  how  excited  and  fluttery !  Betsy 
had  forgotten  how  fluttery  Aunt  Frances  was ! 
She  clasped  Betsy  to  her,  and  then  started  back 
crying — she  must  see  to  her  suit-case — and  then 
she  clasped  Betsy  to  her  again  and  shook  hands 
with  Uncle  Henry,  whose  grim  old  face  looked 
about  as  cordial  and  welcoming  as  the  sourest 
kind  of  sour  pickle,  and  she  fluttered  back  and 
said  she  must  have  left  her  umbrella  on  the 
train.  "Oh,  Conductor!  Conductor!  My  um- 
brella— right  in  my  seat — a  blue  one  with  a 
crooked-over — oh,  here  it  is  in  my  hand !  What 
am  I  thinking  of!" 

The  conductor  evidently  thought  he'd  better 
get  the  train  away  as  soon  as  possible,  for  he 
now  shouted,  "All  aboard!"  to  nobody  at  all, 


250  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

and  sprang  back  on  the  steps.  The  train  went 
off,  groaning  over  the  steep  grade,  and  scream- 
ing out  its  usual  echoing  warning  about  the 
next  road  crossing. 

Uncle  Henry  took  Aunt  Frances's  suit-case 
and  plodded  back  to  the  surrey.  He  got  into 
the  front  seat  and  Aunt  Frances  and  Betsy  in 
the  back;  and  they  started  off. 

And  now  I  want  you  to  listen  to  every  single 
word  that  was  said  on  the  back  seat,  for  it  was 
a  very,  very  important  conversation,  when 
Betsy's  fate  hung  on  the  curl  of  an  eyelash  and 
the  flicker  of  a  voice,  as  fates  often  do. 

Aunt  Frances  hugged  Betsy  again  and  again 
and  exclaimed  about  her  having  grown  so  big 
and  tall  and  fat — she  didn't  say  brown  too,  al- 
though you  could  see  that  she  was  thinking  that, 
as  she  looked  through  her  veil  at  Betsy's  tanned 
face  and  down  at  the  contrast  between  her  own 
pretty,  white  fingers  and  Betsy's  leather- 
colored,  muscular  little  hands.  She  exclaimed 
and  exclaimed  and  kept  on  exclaiming !    Betsy 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "    251 

wondered  if  she  really  always  had  been  as  flut- 
tery  as  this.  And  then,  all  of  a  sudden  it  came 
out,  the  great  news,  the  reason  for  the  extra 
flutteriness. 

Aunt  Frances  was  going  to  be  married! 

Yes!  Think  of  it!  Betsy  fell  back  open- 
mouthed  with  astonishment. 

"Did  Betsy  think  her  Aunt  Frances  a  silly 
old  thing?" 

"Oh,  Aunt  Frances,  no!"  cried  Betsy  fer- 
vently. "You  look  just  as  young,  and  pretty! 
Lots  younger  than  I  remembered  you ! ' ' 

Aunt  Frances  flushed  with  pleasure  and  went 
on,  "You'll  love  your  old  Aunt  Frances  just 
as  much,  won't  you,  when  she's  Mrs.  Plimp- 
ton?" 

Betsy  put  her  arms  around  her  and  gave  her 
a  great  hug.  "I'll  always  love  you,  Aunt  Fran- 
ces!" she  said. 

"You'll  love  Mr.  Plimpton,  too.  He's  so  big 
and  strong,  and  he  just  loves  to  take  care  of 
people.  He  says  that's  why  he's  marrying  me. 
Don't  you  wonder  where  we  are  going  to  live?" 


252  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

she  asked,  answering  her  own  question  quickly. 
"We're  not  going  to  live  anywhere.  Isn't  that 
a  joke?  Mr.  Plimpton's  business  keeps  him  al- 
ways moving  around  from  one  place  to  another, 
never  more  than  a  month  anywhere." 

"What '11  Aunt  Harriet  do?"  asked  Betsy 
wonderingly. 

"Why,  she's  ever  and  ever  so  much  better," 
said  Aunt  Frances  happily.  "And  her  own 
sister,  my  Aunt  Rachel,  has  come  back  from 
China,  where  she's  been  a  missionary  for  ever 
so  long,  and  the  two  old  ladies  are  going  to 
keep  house  together  out  in  California,  in  the 
dearest  little  bungalow,  all  roses  and  honey- 
suckle. But  you're  going  to  be  with  me.  Won't 
it  be  jolly  fun,  darling,  to  go  traveling  all  about 
everywhere,  and  see  new  places  all  the 
time!" 

Now  those  are  the  words  Aunt  Frances  said, 
but  something  in  her  voice  and  her  face  sug- 
gested a  faint  possibility  to  Betsy  that  maybe 
Aunt  Frances  didn't  really  think  it  would  be 
such  awfully  jolly  fun  as  her  words  said. 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  253 

Her  heart  gave  a  big  jump  up,  and  she  had 
to  hold  tight  to  the  arm  of  the  surrey  before 
she  could  ask,  in  a  quiet  voice,  "But,  Aunt 
Frances,  won't  I  be  awfully  in  your  way,  travel- 
ing around  so?" 

Now,  Aunt  Frances  had  ears  of  her  own,  and 
though  that  was  what  Betsy's  words  said,  what 
Aunt  Frances  heard  was  a  suggestion  that  pos- 
sibly Betsy  wasn't  as  crazy  to  leave  Putney 
Farm  as  she  had  supposed  of  course  she  would 
be. 

They  both  stopped  talking  for  a  moment  and 
peered  at  each  other  through  the  thicket  of 
words  that  held  them  apart.  I  told  you  this 
was  a  very  momentous  conversation.  One  sure 
thing  is  that  the  people  on  the  back  seat  saw 
the  inside  of  the  surrey  as  they  traveled  along, 
and  nothing  else.  Red  sumac  and  bronzed 
beech-trees  waved  their  flags  at  them  in  vain. 
They  kept  their  eyes  fixed  on  each  other  in- 
tently, each  in  an  agony  of  fear  lest  she  hurt 
the  other's  feelings. 

After  a  pause  Aunt  Frances  came  to  herself 


254  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

with  a  start,  and  said,  affectionately  putting  her 
arm  around  Betsy,  "Why,  you  darling,  what 
does  Aunt  Frances  care  about  trouble  if  her 
own  dear  baby-girl  is  happy?" 

And  Betsy  said,  resolutely,  "Oh,  you  know, 
Aunt  Frances,  I'd  love  to  be  with  you!"  She 
ventured  one  more  step  through  the  thicket. 
"But  honestly,  Aunt  Frances,  won't  it  be  a 
bother  .  .  .?" 

Aunt  Frances  ventured  another  step  to  meet 
her,  "But  dear  little  girls  must  be  some- 
where ..." 

And  Betsy  almost  forgot  her  caution  and 
burst  out,  "But  I  could  stay  here !  I  know  they 
would  keep  me!" 

Even  Aunt  Frances's  two  veils  could  not  hide 
the  gleam  of  relief  and  hope  that  came  into  her 
pretty,  thin,  sweet  face.  She  summoned  all  her 
courage  and  stepped  out  into  the  clearing  in 
the  middle  of  the  thicket,  asking  right  out, 
boldly,  "Why,  do  you  like  it  here,  Betsy? 
Would  you  like  to  stay?" 

And  Betsy — she  never  could  remember  after- 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  255 
ward  if  she  had  been  careful  enough  not  to 
shout  too  loudly  and  joyfully — Betsy  cried  out, 
' '  Oh,  I  love  it  here ! ' '  There  they  stood,  face  to 
face,  looking  at  each  other  with  honest  and  very 
happy  eyes. 

Aunt  Frances  threw  her  arm  around  Betsy 
and  asked  again,  "Are  you  sure,  dear?"  and 
didn't  try  to  hide  her  relief.  And  neither  did 
Betsy. 

"I  could  visit  you  once  in  a  while,  when  you 
are  somewhere  near  here,"  suggested  Betsy, 
beaming. 

' '  Oh,  yes,  I  must  have  some  of  the  time  with 
my  darling!"  said  Aunt  Frances.  And  this 
time  there  was  nothing  in  their  hearts  that  con- 
tradicted their  lips.  ^ 

They  clung  to  each  other  in  speechless  satis- 
faction as  Uncle  Henry  guided  the  surrey  up 
to  the  marble  stepping-stone.  Betsy  jumped 
out  first,  and  while  Uncle  Henry  was  helping 
Aunt  Frances  out,  she  was  dashing  up  the  walk 
like  a  crazy  thing.  She  flung  open  the  front 
door  and  catapulted  into  Aunt  Abigail  just  com- 


256  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

ing  out.  It  was  like  flinging  herself  into  a 
feather-bed.  .    .    . 

"Oh!  Oh!"  she  gasped  out.  "Aunt  Frances 
is  going  to  be  married.  And  travel  around  all 
the  time!  And  she  doesn't  really  want 
me  at  all!  Can't  I  stay  here?  Can't  I  stay- 
here?" 

Cousin  Ann  was  right  behind  Aunt  Abigail, 
and  she  heard  this.  She  looked  over  their  shoul- 
ders toward  Aunt  Frances,  who  was  approach- 
ing from  behind,  and  said,  in  her  usual  calm 
and  collected  voice:  "How  do  you  do,  Frances? 
Glad  to  see  you,  Frances.  How  well  you're 
looking !  I  hear  you  are  in  for  congratulations. 
"Who's  the  happy  man?" 

Betsy  was  overcome  with  admiration  for  her 
coolness  in  being  able  to  talk  so  in  such  an  ex- 
citing moment.  She  knew  Aunt  Abigail  couldn't 
have  done  it,  for  she  had  sat  down  in  a  rocking- 
chair,  and  was  holding  Betsy  on  her  lap.  The 
little  girl  could  see  her  wrinkled  old  hand 
trembling  on  the  arm  of  the  chair. 

"I  hope  that  means,"  continued  Cousin  Ann, 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  257 

going  as  usual  straight  to  the  point,  "that  we 
can  keep  Betsy  here  with  us." 

"Oh,  would  you  like  to?"  asked  Aunt  Fran- 
ces, fluttering,  as  though  the  idea  had  never 
occurred  to  her  before  that  minute.  "Would 
Elizabeth  Ann  really  like  to  stay?" 

"Oh,  I'd  like  to,  all  right!"  said  Betsy,  look- 
ing confidently  up  into  Aunt  Abigail's  face. 

Aunt  Abigail  spoke  now.  She  cleared  her 
throat  twice  before  she  could  bring  out  a  word. 
Then  she  said,  "Why,  yes,  we'd  kind  of  like  to 
keep  her.  We've  sort  of  got  used  to  having  her 
around. ' ' 

That's  what  she  said,  but,  as  you  have  no- 
ticed before  on  this  exciting  day,  what  people 
said  didn't  matter  as  much  as  what  they  looked ; 
and  as  her  old  lips  pronounced  these  words  so 
quietly  the  corners  of  Aunt  Abigail's  mouth 
were  twitching,  and  she  was  swallowing  hard. 
She  said,  impatiently,  to  Cousin  Ann,  "Hand 
me  that  handkerchief,  Ann ! ' '  And  as  she  blew 
her  nose,  she  said, ' '  Oh,  what  an  old  fool  lam!" 

Then,  all  of  a  sudden,  it  was  as  though  a 


258  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

great,  fresh  breeze  had  blown  through  the 
house.  They  all  drew  a  long  breath  and  began 
to  talk  loudly  and  cheerfully  about  the  weather 
and  Aunt  Frances's  trip  and  how  Aunt  Har- 
riet was  and  which  room  Aunt  Frances  was  to 
have  and  would  she  leave  her  wraps  down  in  the 
hall  or  take  them  upstairs — and,  in  the  midst 
of  this,  Betsy,  her  heart  ready  to  burst,  dashed 
out  of  doors,  followed  by  Shep.  She  ran  madly 
toward  the  barn.  She  did  not  know  where  she 
was  going.  She  only  knew  that  she  must  run 
and  jump  and  shout,  or  she  would  explode. 

Shep  ran  and  jumped  because  Betsy  did. 

To  these  two  wild  creatures,  careering 
through  the  air  like  bright-blown  autumn  leaves, 
appeared  little  Molly  in  the  barn  door. 

' '  Oh,  I  'm  going  to  stay !  I  'm  going  to  stay !  I ' 
screamed  Betsy. 

But  as  Molly  had  not  had  any  notion  of  the 
contrary,  she  only  said,  "Of  course,  why  not?" 
and  went  on  to  something  really  important,  say- 
ing, in  a  very  much  capitalized  statement,  "My 
kitten  can  walk!   It  took  three  steps  just  now." 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  259 
After  Aunt  Frances  got  her  wraps  off,  Betsy 
took  her  for  a  tour  of  inspection.  They  went 
all  over  the  house  first,  with  special  emphasis 
laid  on  the  living-room.  " Isn't  this  the  loveli- 
est place?''  said  Betsy,  fervently,  looking  about 
her  at  the  white  curtains,  the  bright  flowers, 
the  southern  sunshine,  the  bookcases,  and  the 
bright  cooking  utensils.  It  was  all  full  to  the 
brim  to  her  eyes  with  happiness,  and  she  for- 
got entirely  that  she  had  thought  it  a  very  poor, 
common  kind  of  room  when  she  had  first  seen 
it.  Nor  did  she  notice  that  Aunt  Frances 
showed  no  enthusiasm  over  it  now. 

She  stopped  for  a  few  moments  to  wash  some 
potatoes  and  put  them  into  the  oven  for  din- 
ner. Aunt  Frances  opened  her  eyes  at  this. 
"I  always  see  to  the  potatoes  and  the  apples, 
the  cooking  of  them,  I  mean,"  explained  Betsy 
proudly.  "I've  just  learned  to  make  apple-pie 
and  brown  betty." 

Then  down  into  the  stone-floored  milk-room, 
where  Aunt  Abigail  was  working  over  butter, 
and  where  Betsy,  swelling  with  pride,  showed 


260  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

Aunt  Frances  how  deftly  and  smoothly  she 
could  manipulate  the  wooden  paddle  and  make 
rolls  of  butter  that  weighed  within  an  ounce 
or  two  of  a  pound. 

" Mercy,  child!  Think  of  your  being  able  to 
do  such  things ! ' '  said  Aunt  Frances,  more  and 
more  astonished. 

They  went  out  of  doors  now,  Shep  bounding 
by  their  side.  Betsy  was  amazed  to  see  that 
Aunt  Frances  drew  back,  quite  nervously,  when- 
ever the  big  dog  frisked  near  her.  Out  in  the 
barn  Betsy  had  a  disappointment.  Aunt  Fran- 
ces just  balked  absolutely  at  those  ladder-like 
stairs — "Oh,  I  couldn't!  I  couldn't,  dear.  Do 
you  go  up  there?    Is  it  quite  safe?" 

"Why,  Aunt  Abigail  went  up  there  to  see  the 
kittens!"  cried  Betsy,  on  the  edge  of  exaspera- 
tion. But  her  heart  softened  at  the  sight  of 
Aunt  Frances's  evident  distress  of  mind  at  the 
very  idea  of  climbing  into  the  loft,  and  she 
brought  the  kittens  down  for  inspection,  Elea- 
nor mewing  anxiously  at  the  top  of  the  stairs. 

On  the  way  back  to  the  house  they  had  an 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "    261 

adventure,  a  sort  of  adventure,  and  it  brought 
home  to  Betsy  once  for  all  how  much  she  loved 
dear,  sweet  Aunt  Frances,  and  just  what  kind 
of  love  it  was. 

As  they  crossed  the  barnyard  the  calf  ap- 
proached them  playfully,  leaping  stiff-legged 
into  the  air,  and  making  a  pretense  of  butting 
at  them  with  its  hornless  young  head. 

Betsy  and  Shep  often  played  with  the  calf 
in  this  way  by  the  half -hour,  and  she  thought 
nothing  of  it  now ;  hardly  noticed  it,  in  fact. 

But  Aunt  Frances  gave  a  loud,  piercing 
shriek,  as  though  she  were  being  cut  into  pieces. 
"Help!  Help!"  she  screamed.  "Betsy!  Oh, 
Betsy!" 

She  had  turned  as  white  as  a  sheet  and  could 
not  take  a  single  step  forward.  "It's  nothing! 
It's  nothing!"  said  Betsy,  rather  impatiently. 
"He's  just  playing.  We  often  play  with  him, 
Shep  and  I." 

The  calf  came  a  little  nearer,  with  lowered 
head.  "Get  away!"  said  Betsy  indifferently, 
kicking  at  him. 


262  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

At  this  hint  of  masterfulness  on  Betsy's  part, 
Aunt  Frances  cried  out,  "Oh,  yes,  Betsy,  do 
make  him  go  away!    Do  make  him  go  away!" 

It  came  over  Betsy  that  Aunt  Frances  was 
really  frightened,  yes,  really;  and  all  at  once 
her  impatience  disappeared,  never  to  come  back 
again.  She  felt  toward  Aunt  Frances  just  as 
she  did  toward  little  Molly,  and  she  acted  ac- 
cordingly. She  stepped  in  front  of  Aunt  Fran- 
ces, picked  up  a  stick,  and  hit  the  calf  a  blow 
on  the  neck  with  it.  He  moved  away,  startled 
and  injured,  looking  at  his  playfellow  with  re- 
proachful eyes.  But  Betsy  was  relentless. 
Aunt  Frances  must  not  be  frightened! 

"Here,  Shep!  Here,  Shep!"  she  called 
loudly,  and  when  the  big  dog  came  bounding  to 
her  she  pointed  to  the  calf  and  said  sternly, 
"Take  him  into  the  barn!  Drive  him  into  the 
barn,  sir!" 

Shep  asked  nothing  better  than  this  com- 
mand, and  charged  forward,  barking  furiously 
and  leaping  into  the  air  as  though  he  intended 
to  eat  the  calf  up  alive.    The  two  swept  across 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  263 

the  barnyard  and  into  the  lower  regions  of  the 
barn.  In  a  moment  Shep  reappeared,  his 
tongue  hanging  out,  his  tail  wagging,  his  eyes 
glistening,  very  proud  of  himself,  and  mounted 
guard  at  the  door. 

Aunt  Frances  hurried  along  desperately 
through  the  gate  of  the  barnyard.  As  it  fell  to 
behind  her  she  sank  down  on  a  rock,  breathless, 
still  pale  and  agitated.  Betsy  threw  her  arms 
around  her  in  a  transport  of  affection.  She  felt 
that  she  understood  Aunt  Frances  as  nobody 
else  could,  the  dear,  sweet,  gentle,  timid  aunt! 
She  took  the  thin,  nervous  white  ringers  in  her 
strong  brown  hands.  "Oh,  Aunt  Frances,  dear, 
darling  Aunt  Frances!"  she  cried,  "how  I  wish 
I  could  always  take  care  of  you." 

The  last  of  the  red  and  gold  leaves  were 
slowly  drifting  to  the  ground  as  Betsy  and 
Uncle  Henry  drove  back  from  the  station 
after  seeing  Aunt  Frances  off.  They  were  not 
silent  this  time,  as  when  they  had  gone  to  meet 
her.     They  were  talking  cheerfully  together, 


264  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

laying  their  plans  for  the  winter  which  was  so 
near.  "I  must  begin  to  bank  the  house  to- 
morrow,''  mused  Uncle  Henry.  "And  those 
apples  have  got  to  go  to  the  cider-mill,  right 
off.  Don't  you  want  to  ride  over  on  top  of 
them,  Betsy,  and  see  'em  made  into  cider?" 

"Oh,  my,  yes!"  said  Betsy,  "that  will  be 
fine!  And  I  must  put  away  Deborah's  summer 
clothes  and  get  Cousin  Ann  to  help  me  make 
some  warm  ones,  if  I'm  going  to  take  her  to 
school  in  cold  weather." 

As  they  drove  into  the  yard,  they  saw  Eleanor 
coming  from  the  direction  of  the  barn  with 
something  big  and  heavy  in  her  mouth.  She 
held  her  head  as  high  as  she  could,  but  even  so, 
her  burden  dragged  on  the  ground,  bumping 
softly  against  the  rough  places  on  the  path. 
"Look!"  said  Betsy.  "Just  see  that  great  rat 
Eleanor  has  caught!" 

Uncle  Henry  squinted  his  old  eyes  toward  the 
cat  for  a  moment  and  laughed.  "We're  not  the 
only  ones  that  are  getting  ready  for  winter," 
he  remarked. 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  265 

Betsy  did  not  know  what  he  meant  and 
climbed  hastily  over  the  wheel  and  ran  to  see. 
As  she  approached  Eleanor,  the  cat  laid  her 
burden  down  with  an  air  of  relief  and  looked 
trustfully  into  her  little  mistress's  face.  "Why, 
it  was  one  of  the  kittens !  Eleanor  was  bringing 
it  to  the  house.  Oh,  of  course!  they  mustn't 
stay  out  there  in  that  cold  hayloft  now  the  cold 
weather  was  drawing  near.  Betsy  picked  up 
the  little  sprawling  thing,  trying  with  weak  legs 
to  get  around  over  the  rough  ground.  She  car- 
ried it  carefully  toward  the  house,  Eleanor 
walking  sinuously  by  her  side  and  " talking"  in 
little  singing,  purring  miauws  to  explain  her 
ideas  of  kitten-comfort.  Betsy  felt  that  she 
quite  understood  her.  "Yes,  Eleanor,  a  nice 
little  basket  behind  the  stove  with  a  warm  piece 
of  an  old  blanket  in  it.  Yes,  I'll  fix  it  for  you. 
It'll  be  lovely  to  have  the  whole  family  there. 
And  I'll  bring  the  other  one  in  for  you." 

But  evidently  Eleanor  did  not  understand 
little-girl  talk  as  well  as  Betsy  understood  cat- 
talk,  for  a  little  later,  as  Betsy  turned  from  the 


266  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

nest  she  was  making  in  the  corner  behind  the 
stove,  Eleanor  was  missing;  and  when  she  ran 
out  toward  the  barn  she  met  her  again,  her 
head  strained  painfully  back,  dragging  another 
fat,  heavy  kitten,  who  curled  his  pink  feet  up 
as  high  as  he  could  in  a  vain  effort  not  to  have 
them  knock  against  the  stones.  "Now,  Elea- 
nor," said  Betsy,  a  little  put  out,  "you  don't 
trust  me  enough!  I  was  going  to  get  it  all 
right!" 

"Well,"  said  Aunt  Abigail,  as  they  came  into 
the  kitchen,  "now  you  must  begin  to  teach  them 
to  drink." 

"Goodness!"  said  Betsy,  "don't  they  know 
how  to  drink  already?" 

"You  try  them  and  see,"  said  Aunt  Abigail 
with  a  mysterious  smile. 

So  when  Uncle  Henry  brought  the  pails  full  of 
fragrant,  warm  milk  into  the  house,  Betsy  poured 
out  some  in  a  saucer  and  put  the  kittens  up  to 
it.  She  and  Molly  squatted  down  on  their  heels 
to  watch,  and  before  long  they  were  laughing 
so  that  they  were  rolling  on  the  kitchen  floor. 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  267 

At  first  the  kittens  looked  every  way  but  at  the 
milk,  seeming  to  see  everything  but  what  was 
under  their  noses.  Then  Graykin  (that  was 
Betsy's)  absent-mindedly  walked  right  through 
the  saucer,  emerging  with  very  wet  feet  and  a 
very  much  aggrieved  and  astonished  expres- 
sion. Molly  screamed  with  laughter  to  see  him 
shake  his  little  pink  toes  and  finally  sit  down 
seriously  to  lick  them  clean.  Then  White-bib 
(Molly's)  put  his  head  down  to  the  saucer. 

1 '  There !  Mine  is  smarter  than  yours ! ' '  said 
Molly.  But  White-bib  went  on  putting  his  head 
down,  down,  down,  clear  into  the  milk  nearly 
up  to  his  eyes,  although  he  looked  very  fright- 
ened and  miserable.  Then  he  jerked  it  up 
quickly  and  sneezed  and  sneezed  and  sneezed, 
such  deliciously  funny  little  baby  sneezes !  He 
pawed  and  pawed  at  his  little  pink  nose  with  his 
little  pink  paw  until  Eleanor  took  pity  on  him 
and  came  to  wash  him  off.  In  the  midst  of  this 
process  she  saw  the  milk,  and  left  off  to  lap  it 
up  eagerly ;  and  in  a  jiffy  she  had  drunk  every 
drop  and  was  licking  the  saucer  loudly  with  her 


268  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

raspy  tongue.  And  that  was  the  end  of  the 
kittens'  first  lesson. 

That  evening,  as  they  sat  around  the  lamp, 
Eleanor  came  and  got  up  in  Betsy's  lap  just 
like  old  times.  Betsy  was  playing  checkers 
with  Uncle  Henry  and  interrupted  the  game  to 
welcome  the  cat  back  delightedly.  But  Eleanor 
was  uneasy,  and  kept  stopping  her  toilet  to 
prick  up  her  ears  and  look  restlessly  toward  the 
basket,  where  the  kittens  lay  curled  so  closely 
together  that  they  looked  like  one  soft  ball  of 
gray  fur.  By  and  by  Eleanor  jumped  down 
heavily  and  went  back  to  the  basket.  She 
stayed  there  only  a  moment,  standing  over  the 
kittens  and  licking  them  convulsively,  and  then 
she  came  back  and  got  up  in  Betsy's  lap  again. 

"What  ails  that  cat?"  said  Cousin  Ann,  not- 
ing this  pacing  and  restlessness. 

"Maybe  she  wants  Betsy  to  hold  her  kittens, 
too,"  suggested  Aunt  Abigail. 

"Oh,  I'd  love  to!"  said  Betsy,  spreading  out 
her  knees  to  make  her  lap  bigger. 

"But  I  want  my  own  White-bib  myself !' '  said 


"  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  269 

Molly,  looking  up  from  the  beads  she  was 
stringing. 

"Well,  maybe  Eleanor  would  let  you  settle 
it  that  way,"  said  Cousin  Ann. 

The  little  girls  ran  over  to  the  basket  and 
brought  back  each  her  own  kitten.  Eleanor 
watched  them  anxiously,  but  as  soon  as  they 
sat  down  she  jumped  up  happily  into  Betsy's 
lap  and  curled  down  close  to  little  Graykin. 
This  time  she  was  completely  satisfied,  and  her 
loud  purring  filled  the  room  with  a  peaceable 
murmur. 

"There,  now  you're  fixed  for  the  winter," 
said  Aunt  Abigail. 

By  and  by,  after  Cousin  Ann  had  popped 
some  corn,  old  Shep  got  off  the  couch  and  came 
to  stand  by  Betsy's  knee  to  get  an  occasional 
handful.  Eleanor  opened  one  eye,  recognized  a 
friend,  and  shut  it  sleepily.  But  the  little  kit- 
ten woke  up  in  terrible  alarm  to  see  that  hideous 
monster  so  near  him,  and  prepared  to  sell  his 
life  dearly.  He  bristled  up  his  ridiculous  little 
tail,  opened  his  absurd,  little  pink  mouth  in  a 


270  UNDERSTOOD  BETSY 

soft,  baby  s — s — s — ,  and  struck  savagely  at 
old  Shep's  good-natured  face  with  a  soft  little 
paw.  Betsy  felt  her  heart  overflow  with  amuse- 
ment and  pride  in  the  intrepid  little  morsel. 
She  burst  into  laughter,  but  she  picked  it  up  and 
held  it  lovingly  close  to  her  cheek.  "What  fun 
it  was  going  to  be  to  see  those  kittens  grow  up ! 

Old  Shep  padded  back  softly  to  the  couch,  his 
toe-nails  clicking  on  the  floor,  hoisted  himself 
heavily  up,  and  went  to  sleep.  The  kitten  sub- 
sided into  a  ball  again.  Eleanor  stirred  and 
stretched  in  her  sleep  and  laid  her  head  in  utter 
trust  on  her  little  mistress's  hand.  After  that 
Betsy  moved  the  checkers  only  with  her  other 
hand. 

In  the  intervals  of  the  game,  while  Uncle 
Henry  was  pondering  over  his  moves,  the  little 
girl  looked  down  at  her  pets  and  listened  ab- 
sently to  the  keen  autumnal  wind  that  swept 
around  the  old  house,  shaking  the  shutters  and 
rattling  the  windows.  A  stick  of  wood  in  the 
stove  burned  in  two  and  fell  together  with  a 
soft,  whispering  sound.    The  lamp  cast  a  steady 


«  UNDERSTOOD  AUNT  FRANCES  "  271 

radiance  on  Uncle  Henry  bent  seriously  over 
the  checker-board,  on  Molly's  blooming,  round 
cheeks  and  bright  hair,  on  Aunt  Abigail's 
rosy,  cheerful,  wrinkled  old  face,  and  on  Cousin 
Ann's  quiet,  clear,  dark  eyes.  .   .  . 

That  room  was  full  to  the  brim  of  something 
beautiful,  and  Betsy  knew  what  it  was.  Its 
name  was  Happiness. 


THE  END. 


xomx+m* 


Lj«gg^  '<**»«*&**'  fitifr    ■ 


